More than $175K in Matching for Fifth Annual UW Giving Day

Donors to the University of Wyoming can take advantage of over $175,000 in matching opportunities and double their impact on UW Giving Day Tuesday, Dec. 3. 

The fifth annual UW Giving Day (www.uwyo.edu/givingday) will take from midnight to midnight Mountain Standard Time Dec. 3. This day of giving follows the shopping days of Black Friday and Cyber Monday and coincides with the international tradition of Giving Tuesday.

Donors who give on UW Giving Day can have their donations to UW doubled.

“UW’s Giving Day is a day of impact when our alumni and friends come together to support the university, college, department, program, team or project that they care about,” says Jack Tennant, UW Foundation director of annual giving. “Because of the generosity of our UW Foundation board, we are so fortunate to provide an opportunity to double donors’ impact.”

Members of the UW Foundation Board of Directors personally established a fund of $60,000 that will be used to match any gift early in the day. This opportunity will launch at midnight and will be applied on a first-come basis, up to a total of $1,000 per donor, for online gifts only.

Later in the day, there will more opportunities to apply more than $100,000 of unit- or project-specific matching funds. Donors can give in the morning and the afternoon to take advantage of both.

In 2018, UW Giving Day raised a total of $1.1 million in gifts and pledges in a single day, including $308,000 in gifts and $804,000 in major gift commitments from seven generous donors.

The giving day effort was supported by people across campus, across the state and across the nation. First and foremost, the more than 1,000 donors from 37 states and the District of Columbia gave gifts ranging in size from $1 to thousands of dollars.

Donors supported all the UW colleges: Agriculture and Natural Resources; Arts and Sciences; Business; Education; Engineering and Applied Science; Health Sciences; Honors; and Law.

They also supported units such as the Alumni Association; American Heritage Center; Athletics; Club Sports; Haub School of Environment and Natural Resources; Native American Education, Research and Cultural Center; School of Energy Resources; Student Affairs; UW Art Museum; and UW Libraries.

In 2018, the UW unit with the most donors was Club Sports, with 151 donors; and the most money raised was the College of Business, with a total of $463,636.

“One exciting thing that we see on UW Giving Day is that donors support some of the smaller and lower-profile units on campus,” says John Small, UW Foundation senior associate vice president for development. “Particularly with the matching opportunities, donors often create a transformational impact for these areas.”

UW Giving Day is an annual tradition held in conjunction with Giving Tuesday, an international tradition that takes place the Tuesday after Thanksgiving from midnight to midnight. Giving Tuesday has raised more than $1 billion in the U.S. since its founding in 2012.