Current and former CEOs and leaders of Boeing, Microsoft, Costco, Weyerhauser, Delta Airlines, and other major companies are committing their energy and abilities to state Rep. Tim Probst’s Opportunity Scholarships program. Today, Gov. Gregoire announced the seven-person board of directors for the new college scholarship program, which is the state’s first scholarship program reaching far into the middle class.
Probst’s bill creating the program passed the state Legislature earlier this year, with overwhelming bipartisan support. Called “a G.I. Bill for our middle class students” by Probst (D-Clark County) and other supporters, it is funded through a public-private partnership, creating thousands of Opportunity Scholarships for students studying for bachelor’s degrees in high-demand fields. Probst designed the scholarships to address the fact that tuition increases are making college harder to afford for middle income families. Students from families with earnings up to 125% of the state’s average income can apply. For a family of four, that figure is roughly $98,000 a year.
“Today’s announcement shows that major companies will be supporting this effort and asking their peers to support it, Probst said. “That means more donations from the private sector, and more students getting scholarships.”
Probst added, “This is what can happen when Americans focus on serving our neighbors instead of dividing our country. Companies and government, Democrats and Republicans, we all put our heads together and found a completely new answer. This is how American democracy was supposed to work in the first place.”
The scholarships will be financed by contributions from the state and private industry. The state allocated $5 million in seed money for the program and Boeing and Microsoft have already committed $50 million, combined.
The amount per scholarship and application process will be decided by the board.
Named to the board today were:
Jim Albaugh Albaugh is president and chief executive officer of Boeing Commercial Airplanes in Seattle and executive vice president of The Boeing Co. He is responsible for all the company’s commercial aircraft programs and services. He is a Washington state native.
Brad Smith Smith is Microsoft’s general counsel, responsible for the company’s legal work, its intellectual property portfolio and patent licensing business, and its government affairs and philanthropic work. He has served as chair of the Washington Roundtable, a leading business organization, and in 2010 he chaired Gov. Gregoire’s Higher Education Funding Task Force.
Mack Hogans Hogans was a longtime senior executive at the Weyerhaeuser Co. A forester, he holds a Master of Science degree in forest resources from the University of Washington. He is a former trustee of the University of Puget Sound and has served on numerous corporate and nonprofit boards.
Kimberly Harris Harris is CEO of Puget Sound Energy, the state’s largest utility company. She started at the company in 1977, when she was the second lawyer hired in the utility’s newly formed legal department. She serves on the board of directors of the American Red Cross for King and Kitsap Counties and formerly was on the board of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
Theresa Gillespie Gillespie is “tax matters partner” at Trilogy International Partners, a wireless communications investment company she co-founded with her husband, John Stanton, and a third investor in 2005. She and her husband are veterans of the industry: In 1988, they founded Stanton Communications, which later evolved into Western Wireless, the ancestor company of VoiceStream and T-Mobile.
Jim Sinegal Sinegal is a co-founder of Costco Wholesale Corp. and has been its chief executive officer since October 1993. He serves as trustee of Seattle University and of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.
Jerry Grinstein Grinstein is a venture capitalist in Seattle and former CEO of Delta Air Lines. He also served as chairman of what is now BNSF Railway. He is a former member of the Board of Regents at the University of Washington and has served on the boards of several corporations and nonprofit organizations.
