Background

Millions of dollars are raised each year for academic and athletic scholarships. The Bonner Foundation believes that a third type of merit scholarship, based on community engagement, should be available at all colleges and universities.

The Bonner Program offers one of the largest, oldest, and most successful models for this type of scholarship initiative. Started in 1990, the Bonner Scholars Program supports individuals who otherwise could not afford to attend college because of financial need. The Bonner Foundation works with participating colleges selected by the Foundation and supports approximately 1,600 students at 27 institutions. The Foundation provides up to $4,500 per student annually to supplement the financial aid package provided by the school. In return for the financial support, the Bonner Scholars are expected to engage in 10 hours a week of community service during the school year and 280 hours in the summer.

Though the Foundation is unable to expand the number of Bonner Scholar schools we support financially, the Foundation is committed to exploring ways to partner with new schools that are dedicated to creating service scholarships on their campuses. This commitment inspired the Foundation to write a variety of grants to assist us in learning how to create service-based scholarship programs at additional campuses. This initiative resulted in the creation of the Bonner Leaders Program.

In 1997 the Bonner Foundation partnered with AmeriCorps, a division of the Corporation for National and Community Service. AmeriCorps continues to award the Foundation a number of AmeriCorps "slots" or positions each year, which we can then distribute to our individual campus partners.

In 1998 the Foundation received a grant from the Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education (FIPSE) that allowed us to begin partnering with six new schools interested in offering service scholarships on their campuses. Together, we explored new ways of creating service scholarship opportunities for students who would not receive direct funding from the Foundation. Campuses in the Bonner Leader Program have each designed innovative models that use federal work-study funds, AmeriCorps Education Awards, and institutional support to create scholarship stipends for students involved in community service as part of the Bonner Program.

The lessons learned from these grants helped the Bonner Foundation establish the core elements and best practices for modeling a successful campus-based service scholarship program.

Bonner Foundation and the College of New Jersey

The partnership with the Bonner Foundation in the creation of the Bonner Leaders Program is ongoing. The Bonner Foundation in conjunction with The College of New Jersey (TCNJ) applies to the Corporation annually for an AmeriCorps education award grant. Individual schools can then access these AmeriCorps positions directly through the Bonner Leaders Program each year. The Bonner Foundation also encourages consortia of schools to apply for AmeriCorps funding.

In addition, the Bonner Foundation / TCNJ staff is available for technical assistance and questions from Bonner Leader schools. Our program officers visit each campus at least once a year and maintain regular contact with schools via email and phone.

Our resources and conferences are available to all Bonner Leader schools. Over the past 14 years the Foundation has generated a variety of handbooks and reference manuals that are useful when creating service-based scholarship programs. There is at least one national conference every year that all partner schools are invited to attend. This serves as a time for networking with both Bonner Leaders and Bonner Scholars Program directors. In addition, our web-based reporting system has been developed to facilitate reporting for our schools and to enable schools to generate service portfolios.