Harrisburg, Pa., July 13, 2022—Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf signed HB1642 into law on Friday, July 8, 2022, a public school system bill which includes a prohibition on scholarship displacement at public colleges and universities. The law makes Pennsylvania the fourth state in the country to eliminate the practice of colleges and universities reducing a student’s financial aid package when the student receives a private scholarship.
A statewide coalition of scholarship providers, including the Lehigh Valley Community Foundation (LVCF), initiated the call for elimination of scholarship displacement. The bill goes into effect immediately and will affect awards for the upcoming academic year.
“We are pleased that students attending public colleges and universities in Pennsylvania will now more fully benefit from receiving scholarships from the Community Foundation,” said Carrie Krug Nedick, Director of Donor Services at LVCF. “Prior to passage of this bill, when a donor provided a scholarship award to a student, the university would sometimes reduce that student’s financial aid package accordingly. In some cases, it eliminates the scholarship’s benefit to the student and undermines the donor’s purpose in awarding the scholarship which is to assist meritorious students with financial need.”
The coalition advocating for the change included members of the Pennsylvania Community Foundation Association (LVCF is a founding member), the Miss Pennsylvania Scholarship Foundation, the Philadelphia College Prep Roundtable, and Pittsburgh’s Poise Foundation.
The Pennsylvania Association of Community Foundations (PACFA) is a network of 31 individual community foundations, all working to enhance the quality of life in the regions they serve by growing permanent endowment funds, through creative and thoughtful grantmaking, tailored donor education and through dynamic community leadership partnerships. Learn more about the Pennsylvania Community Foundation Association at: https://www.pacfapartners.org/.
