Many families share altruistic desires of donating and giving back to communities in which they live and operate. Publicly such families should be celebrated and applauded for their desires and efforts. However, privately the act of donating is often met with deeply ingrained frustrations about the lack of rigour and transparency around how donations are managed. For example, how much of each donation actually trickles through the layers of administrative costs to reach the front line?
Now GPFO has teamed up with INTCAS, the education technology company, to solve this particular problem with respect to one particularly powerful way of giving back: university scholarships.
Across the world we are blessed with many gifted students who aspire to change the fabric of society. But we live in an unfair world where many such students are blocked from achieving their full potential. Such talent must be harnessed in order to create and promote a more tolerant, peaceful, fair and pluralistic world where we celebrate our similarities and debate our differences. Regretfully, such talented students are often hindered by a lack of opportunity and more importantly money to pursue their studies either locally in their home country or to study abroad. Failing to identify and harness such talent is society’s collective loss.
INTCAS has recently completed its technology platform for attracting, recruiting and managing international students. To complement its technology, it is from this year rolling out support centres globally to provide face-to-face support for students and their families. INTCAS also has strong links with governments, banks, schools, and awarding bodies. In short, INTCAS has the infrastructure for identifying, sourcing and managing gifted students from disadvantaged backgrounds. We can mentor such students to apply to leading global universities and later return home to build meaningful careers that add cultural, social and economic value to their country.
The missing link is how do we finance such students? This is where the GPFO and the INTCAS World Scholarship Programme come into play. Working with GPFO, INTCAS is inviting family offices to establish and manage their own family scholarship fund within INTCAS. Each family may now deposit their annual donation into their scholarship fund branded under their family name and provide INTCAS with their admission criteria. INTCAS’ technology will intelligently match the family’s scholarship fund with gifted students that match their criteria. Our technology and support centres then verify the student and help them enrol at a suitable university.
An additional and profound benefit of the World Scholarship Programme is that INTCAS is picking up the tab for all the administrational overheads. INTCAS sees itself as a social enterprise and has committed a significant percentage of profits to running its charitably foundation. This means that when you donate money to an INTCAS managed scholarship fund, 100 per cent of that money goes to the student.
Let us consider an example. The Chang Family, a Thai family who have built an impressive portfolio of businesses in the oil & gas industry, are passionate about clean technology. They wish to sponsor gifted Thai girls from disadvantaged backgrounds to study engineering at leading Ivy League schools in the U.S. INTCAS will help identify such Thai students, who will now have the opportunity to study at Ivy League schools as a Chang Scholar. Students graduating and returning to Thailand may build their careers within leading engineering companies. Perhaps they will even establish their own social enterprise. Furthermore, ever-grateful for the support they received, thereafter they agree to donate a percentage of yearly earnings to the Chang Family Scholarship Fund. The Chang Family name will be proudly displayed on the main campus in each university that participates in the INTCAS World Scholarship Programme.
Collectively, INTCAS and GPFO are opening their doors to invite families across the world to join them in their pursuit of making the world more connected and caring. It is clear that education is integral to making the world a better place, helping millions of talented students with the opportunity of helping their families and country. For further information, why not connect with GPFO and discuss how your family can now establish their own scholarship fund?
Zakaria S. Mahmood is Chief Executive of INTCAS
