PROMISES KEPT

UPMC saluted for $100 million commitment to Pittsburgh Promise

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

The Pittsburgh Promise honored UPMC on Thursday for making the last installment of its $100 million commitment to the scholarship program.

“There has never been a gift of this magnitude to urban public schools,” said Saleem Ghubril, Promise executive director.

UPMC’s $41 million contribution, set to be formally transferred to the Promise this summer, caps off the 10-year “challenge grant” that began in 2007. So long as other entities came up with $150 million in the same period, the health care giant said it would provide up to $100 million.

Though the Promise missed the mark, raising $94 million, UPMC fulfilled the pledge.

Since 2008, the program has awarded more than 7,200 scholarships worth more than $100 million. About 1,600 graduates have earned some sort of credential after school. About 1,000 scholarship recipients are working in the Pittsburgh region.

Beginning with the Class of 2017, the maximum scholarship amount students can receive over a four-year period is $30,000 — down from $40,000 — to help lengthen the life of the program through 2028.

At the ceremony Thursday at Pittsburgh CAPA 6-12, UPMC president and CEO Jeffrey Romoff said the program “has exceeded our expectations for its impact on the entire school district, on thousands of high school students and post-secondary school graduates, and on our entire community. Our regional workforce, including at UPMC, is already benefiting from the outcomes of this effort.”

A donor, who has yet to be identified, is expected to to announce a new contribution to the scholarship program next week during a ceremony celebrating Promise scholars.