Exeter’s first ever Giving Day is a roaring success!
Rector Trainor (left) and the T-RExeter joined in the fun of the Giving Day
On 19 November Exeter College held its first ever Giving Day, with a series of fun challenges, competitions and social media posts to encourage donations and raise awareness of how your support helps our students.
The day was an overwhelming success, with 382 people making a gift to the College and together raising more than £53,000. The money raised will be used to support three key priorities, chosen by students and alumni: access and outreach, student support, and the College library.
Throughout the day the ‘T-RExeter’ – the Giving Day mascot – made a series of appearances in College and online and gave everyone a very welcome chuckle during what has been an extraordinary and challenging time in College and beyond. You can watch the T-RExeter’s mischief on Twitter and Instagram at #TRExeter.
Exeter’s fabulous catering team also brought smiles to people’s faces by baking delicious cupcakes, free to students and staff.
On social media we held competitions for the cutest pet photos, with prizes for the most adorable dog, cat, and anything-but-a-cat-or-dog! There was also a raffle for anyone who made a gift of at least £5, with prizes including Exeter stash, a personalised, signed copy of Philip Pullman’s (1965, English) new book, Serpentine, and magnums of Ambriel Classic Cuvée, the award-winning English sparkling wine produced and donated by alumnus Charles Outhwaite (1984, Modern History).
With so many alumni, students, staff and friends of the College making gifts, a series of challenges were met and further gifts released. These included a gift of £1,000 if 35 alumni under the age of 35 made a gift (in fact well over 100 donated!), a gift of £1,000 if 50 first-time donors made a gift (with the actual total being an impressive 97!), and over £3,000 of gifts for not only meeting our goal of at least 200 donors, but also smashing our stretch-target of over 350 donors!
The day was enormous fun, with the T-RExeter in particular making a lot of new friends in College and on social media. Crucially, the money raised will help to attract and support the very best students and provide for them modern study facilities in the College’s beautiful Victorian Gothic library. As part of the College’s commitment to attracting the best possible students, including students from groups that are underrepresented at Oxford, some of the money raised will help finance the College’s first Black Academic Futures Scholarship for a black or mixed-black postgraduate student from the UK.
Speaking after the Giving Day, Director of Development and Alumni Relations Yvonne Rainey said: ‘Thank you to everyone who got involved and made a gift during Exeter’s first ever Giving Day! I hope that you had as much fun with the cute pet competition and the T-RExeter as the team here did.’
If you would like to make a gift to support Exeter’s students please click here.
