LETTER FROM BOARD OF TRUSTEES CHAIRMAN
Dear Ransom Everglades Community,
I’ve been honored to work with a visionary team of leaders on the Ransom Everglades
Board of Trustees, and I count myself lucky to have concluded my tenure as board
chair during a transformative and exciting 12 months. I can’t thank my colleagues
enough for their dedication and progressive thinking over the last two years, and
I remain grateful to Head of School Penny Townsend for her spirit, support and
strong leadership.
As I reflect on what we’ve accomplished together, I recognize that our most promising
initiatives and programs have their root in the generosity and patronage of our alumni, parents, grandparents and friends
of Ransom Everglades. Your passion for educating the next generation of leaders led you to entrust us with more than $12
million in total cash, pledges and gifts in kind in 2015-16. Your beneficence pushed us, again, to a record-breaking year for
the school’s Annual Giving program, which drew more than $2.6 million.
We are grateful to our current parents, 86 percent of whom made donations totaling more than $1.6 million. Gifts from
alumni have nearly doubled over the last five years – for that we are thankful and thrilled. Some 93 percent of teachers and
staff at Ransom Everglades donated in 2015-16, testifying to their devotion to the young people they lead.
Your gifts provide our students with the means to reach their full potential in our classrooms and, eventually, as citizens
of the world. You offer them with every opportunity to grow and thrive. And you allow us to continue to boost financial aid
to guarantee that all qualified students, regardless of their financial background, may benefit from an RE education. Last
year, Ransom Everglades awarded more than $5 million in financial aid and tuition remission, supporting students with an
average grant of $27,692.
Your devotion to this school also provides a strong foundation for new dreams and dramatic upgrades. Last June, the school
acquired the La Brisa property just north of the Ransom Campus. La Brisa’s dazzling 6.9 acres, shaded by leafy canopies,
fringed by mangroves and bordering the bayfront, will provide our students with new space to study, learn and explore, while
also giving us the breathing room to tackle a long-awaited Multidisciplinary Center + STEM Institute and other academic
spaces on our current Upper School campus.
Thanks to your generosity, the vision of RE’s leadership and the unyielding promise of our students and faculty, RE can look
forward to another magnificent century.
Eric A. Mendelson
Chairman, 2015-16 Board of Trustees
Ransom Everglades School
Report of Giving 2015-16
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