Inaugurated in 1998, the Phillips Society honors the landmark $9-million endowment bequest of Bates’ fourth president, Charles F. Phillips, and his wife, Evelyn Minard Phillips. Membership includes more than 500 alumni, parents, and friends who have provided for Bates in their estate plans, trusts, or other financial arrangements.
Historically, planned gifts and bequests have been the single largest source of endowment support for Bates.The needs of our students, and the demands that society will place on our graduates, requires Bates to achieve a significantly greater endowment in the coming years. Bequests and other planned gifts to Bates will help to both relieve Bates’ dependence on tuition revenue, and ensure that the college can afford to maintain the highest level of academic excellence and its position of leadership among the nation’s finest liberal arts institutions.
We are grateful for each and every gift that helps ensure that the best of Bates will endure for generations to come.
An alumnus who has given more than $2 million in planned gifts to Bates calls his support “the closest thing I can imagine to an eternal gift to America. I have more confidence that Bates will be doing its work faithfully in a hundred or two hundred years than any other organization I can see.”
Learn more about your options for planned gifts:
- A Gift Anyone Can Give: Plan a Gift by Will
- Give and Receive: Charitable Gift Annuity
- Beneficiary Designations are Easy and Flexible
To join the Phillips Society or learn more about planned gifts, please visit the Gift Planning website or contact Susan Dunning at 207-786-6246.