2018-2019 Annual Report
Staff
Lauren Bell
Executive Director of
Development,
Public Affairs, &
Creative Services
Michelle Joyner
Director of Development
Lindsay Alderman
Development and
Communications
Coordinator
Board of Trustees
NSCC President
Dr. Shanna L. Jackson
Board Chair
Joey Hatch
Vice Chair
Nancy Eisenbrandt
Treasurer
Vic Alexander
Scott Brisson
Ginna Burrell
Bob Clement
Kathy Cloninger
Chad Custer
Stephen Francescon
Paula Harris
Max Knoepfel
Greg Martz
Jovonna Palmer
Randy Rayburn
Rich Rhoda
Robert Sherrill
Laquita Stribling
Nick Taras
Deb Varallo
Jennifer Way
Kelly West
Rod West
Derek Young
Greetings from Nashville State!
What an amazing year we’ve had! We welcomed a new president
last summer who brings with her a new vision for leading the College
—a vision that embraces the challenge of creating a student-ready
institution. With generous donor support, we successfully launched
programs to provide transportation and textbook assistance
for students with plans to address childcare and food insecurity
underway. We spent countless hours meeting with various community
and workforce partners discussing ways we can work together to
support students so they stay in school, earn a degree or credential,
and get a good job. We have been included in discussions around equity and equality
and have faced hard realities about who is and is not succeeding at our institution, and
what can be done to narrow the gaps in success. We are proud to showcase our work
over the past year to impact student success at Nashville State. We continue to be
overwhelmed by the caring and responsive community we live in, and are extremely
grateful for the support of each and every one of you. Together, we are changing lives
one student at a time!
Lauren Bell, Executive Director
Nashville State Community College Foundation
Moving Forward
It is an exciting time to be a part of Nashville State as we enter Year
Two of our Moving Forward agenda! Year One focused on listening,
learning and assessing where we are as a college, and we have
identified the most significant barriers for students to either access
or complete programs at Nashville State. Quite simply, many of our
students are struggling financially and they need support beyond
tuition and fees to deal with day-to-day challenges that include
transportation and nutrition. With your generous contributions,
we are building a holistic system of support to help clear these
obstacles for students choosing Nashville State. We are in a period of transformation
and I could not be more excited for our shared future.
I want to thank you for supporting our college and students through the Nashville
State Community College Foundation. Your time, gifts, talents, and connections are
critical to identifying and securing the resources we need to become a world-class
institution that is ready to serve any student who steps onto our campus. Together,
we are Moving Forward!
Dr. Shanna L. Jackson, President
Nashville State Community College
The Nashville State Community College Foundation’s work — to provide quality
education, remove financial barriers, and empower students at Nashville State to
achieve their dreams for a brighter future — is in service of the College’s mission to
provide comprehensive educational programs and partnerships, exemplary services,
an accessible, progressive learning environment, and responsible leadership to
improve the quality of life for the community we serve.
Our Mission
On the cover:
Nashville State Community
College Nursing student
Terrance Jackson checks vital
signs using state-of-the-art
medical learning equipment
in one of NSCC’s medical
learning labs.
Ambassador Scholarship
Berger Endowed Scholarship
Brian Uhl Scholarship
Cardwell Nursing Scholarship
Cathy O’Bryant Endowed Scholarship
Culinary Arts Scholarship
Dickson High Noon Rotary
Scholarship
ESOL Ambassador Scholarship
HCA Foundation Endowed
Scholarship
ISSA Scholarship
Jacob Roberts Memorial Endowed
Scholarship
Jay Luther Memorial Endowed
Scholarship
Jim Formosa Memorial Scholarship
John E. Mayfield Endowed
Scholarship
Lance Woodward Memorial
Scholarship
Nashville State Community College
Foundation Endowed Scholarship
Nashville State Community College
Foundation Scholarship
Oscar Lasko Endowed Scholarship
Piedmont Natural Gas Scholarship
Randy Rayburn Culinary Arts
Scholarship
Roberts-Williams Memorial
Scholarship
Ted M. Washington Memorial
Endowed Scholarship
Wallace Wilson Scholarship
Women in Technology of
Tennessee Scholarship
Current Scholarships
Nashville State Community College Foundation
Nashville GRAD
46%
Other Program
Support 7%
Scholarships
22%
Transportation
Assistance 11%
Textbook
Assistance 10%
Emergency Fund
4%
479
students received Assistance
from the Foundation during
the 2018-19 Academic Year
$221,905
was designated to support
the students and programs
at Nashville State
Student and Program Support
Sources of Support
Employees 5%
Trustees 6%
Alumni 2%
Corporations 42%
Foundations 22%
Individuals 23%
Textbook
Assistance
Program
The Campus
Cupboard
Transportation
Assistance
Program
Helping Hand
Fund
Child Care
Assistance
Program
Technology
Assistance
Program
Beyond
Financial Aid
Ways we help:
This unique initiative is designed to meet the urgent financial and
resource needs that can easily derail a student’s path to graduation.
Getting to college isn’t the same as getting through college.
That’s why Beyond Financial Aid is here.
Financial aid in the form of tuition assistance for low to moderate-income students helps open the door to higher
education, but the added costs of books, supplies, transportation, and child care – which are often overlooked –
can add up quickly. All too often, these expenses become so overwhelming that students cannot continue their
studies. Gifts to Beyond Financial Aid help provide additional financial and community resources for students in
need who may be on the verge of dropping out.
College students across the country
struggle with food insecurity, and
research demonstrates that community
college students—particularly
community college students of color—
experience the highest rates of hunger.
Campus Cupboard - New for Fall 2019
Textbook Assistance
Program Enters
Second Year
“I’m so very grateful for the textbook
assistance I received this semester.
I lost my job at the end of March and because
of this help, I was able to get my books while
I waited to start my new job in June.”
When students are hungry, they don’t perform well
academically; they have difficulty focusing and exhibit lower
test scores and lower GPAs. Hungry students are also more
likely to miss classes due to illness.
To help alleviate student hunger, our friends at Piedmont
Natural Gas provided the seed investment needed to launch
an on-campus food pantry at Nashville State’s White Bridge
Road Campus. The pantry, known as The Campus Cupboard,
is made possible through a new partnership with Second
Harvest Food Bank of Middle Tennessee and is designed to
help students feel comfortable, supported, and empowered.
The Cupboard is open Monday through Friday whenever
classes are in session, offering groceries and personal care
items to Nashville State students in need.
Through the Beyond Financial Aid initiative, the Foundation
is working to ensure that all Nashville State students have
the resources they need to be successful, and that includes
adequate nutrition. As additional funding is secured, we will
replicate The Campus Cupboard project at all NSCC satellite
campus locations. Interested in supporting this work? Contact
Foundation staff at (615) 353-3222.
Many thanks to our friends at Piedmont Natural Gas for their
tremendous investment in the well-being of our students!
Textbooks can be prohibitively expensive, and yet we know
that students won’t be successful in their courses without
them. That’s why the Foundation established a textbook
assistance program for Tennessee Reconnect students
under the umbrella of the Beyond Financial Aid initiative in
the Fall 2018 semester.
Tennessee Reconnect provides adult students with free
tuition, but the cost of textbooks can be a major stumbling
block that leaves these students in a difficult position.
With the average cost of textbooks exceeding $500 per
semester, many low- and even moderate-income students
cannot afford to continue their education. Since the
program’s launch, the Foundation has assisted more than
150 Reconnect students with textbook support.
Textbook assistance is an important part of the holistic
support that we aspire to provide. We are extremely
grateful to the estate of longtime Nashville State supporter
John E. Mayfield, without whom this program would not
be possible, as well as donors like you who have made
supplemental gifts to ensure that our students have the
tools they need to succeed.
Devra Bagwell, NSCC Student
The winners of this year’s Springer Mountain Farms Knife Fight
were Nashville State Culinary Arts students Sidney Trigg and Kat
Bland and mentor Chef Kyle Patterson, Executive Chef at Sinema.
The NSCC Foundation hosted its
8th Annual Tennessee Flavors event
on March 5th, 2019 at the College’s
White Bridge Road Campus in West
Nashville.
This year’s event was the most successful yet, raising
nearly $79,000 in support of the Randy Rayburn School
of Culinary Arts at Nashville State and the Foundation’s
Beyond Financial Aid initiative.
Tennessee Flavors would not be possible without the
generosity of each and every vendor, volunteer, and
guest taking part in this annual celebration of student
success. If you missed out on the fun this year, make
sure to save the date for our 2020 event on March 10th!
8th Annual Tennessee Flavors
$78,843 raised
Dell Crosslin
Dr. Shanna L. Jackson
Edible Nashville
Farm Burger
FreshPoint
George Dickel
HOAR Construction
Jamal Hipps
Kathy Cloninger
Kraft CPAs PLLC
Etc.
Farm Burger
Frothy Monkey
George Dickel
Grinder’s Switch Winery
H Clark Distillery
Hilton Nashville Hotel
Jack Daniel’s
Jackson Morgan Southern
Cream
Kickin’ Coffee & Tea /
SideKicks Cafe
Love & Exile Wines
51 North Taproom
Amber Falls Winery
Bacon & Caviar
Bang Candy Company
Beachaven Vineyards &
Winery
Cabana
Capitol Grille
Catering & Events by
Suzette
The Corner Market
Corsair Distillery
Deacon’s New South
AllianceBernstein
Bang Candy Company
Barge Design Solutions
Bob Grohovsky
Cabana
CMT/Viacom
Compost Nashville
Cornerstone Financial
Creation Gardens
Debbie and Joey Hatch
This April the Metropolitan Nashville
Airport Authority presented a check for
$15,000 to benefit the Randy Rayburn
School of Culinary Arts at NSCC. Thanks
to support from fantastic community
partners like MNAA, our culinary students
receive training on the latest techniques
and trends in the industry, allowing them
to enter the local workforce as skilled,
kitchen-ready chefs.
Thank you to our 2019 Participating Vendors:
Thank you to our 2019 Sponsors:
NSCC President Dr. Shanna L. Jackson with Tom Jurkovich,
MNAA’s VP of Strategic Communications and External Affairs, and
NSCC culinary arts students.
Kroger
Lyft
Midtown Café
Mountain Glacier
MPYER
Music City Hospitality
Consulting
Nancy Eisenbrandt
Nashville Area Chamber
of Commerce
Makeready Libations &
Liberation
Mangia Nashville
Midtown Café
Mimi’s Girl Artisan Bakery
Music City Center
Nashville Craft
Nelson’s Green Brier Distillery
Nicoletto’s Pasta Co.
Noshville Delicatessen
Randy Rayburn School of
Culinary Arts at NSCC
Old Tennessee Distilling Co.
Nashville Craft
Nelson Mazda
Nelson’s Green Brier Distillery
Nick Taras
Paula Harris
Rod West
Tennessee Hospitality & Tourism
Association
Waller
YMG Enterprises, LLC
Pennington Distilling Co.
Puckett’s Grocery &
Restaurant
Remedy Bone Broth
Scout’s Pub
Sinema
Stonehaus Winery
Tenn South Distillery
TN Smoke House
Trazo Meadery
Vui’s Kitchen
Yazoo Brewing Company
THE
F O U N D AT I O N
HOSPITALITY PROPERTIES
Each year, The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee hosts The
Big Payback, an annual day of giving benefitting hundreds of nonprofit
organizations across the region. The NSCC Foundation is an annual
participant in this celebration of philanthropy, and in 2019, we chose
to raise funds for our Transportation Assistance Program, a critically
important resource under the umbrella of our Beyond Financial Aid
initiative. Your response was truly inspiring!
The Transportation Assistance Program provides semester-long WeGo
Transit bus passes at no cost to students.
On average, our cost to operate the program is roughly $50
per student, per month. On Big Payback Day, we hoped to
raise $7,500—the cost to serve approximately 37 students
for one semester. However, during this 24-hour event, we
raised more than $13,000 to help remove the financial
barrier of transportation for NSCC students!
And thanks to your generosity, The Community Foundation awarded us
the HCA Most Improved Player award for medium-sized nonprofits, worth
an additional $3,500. We can’t overstate the importance of these funds in our students’ lives. Transportation assistance
helps them get to-and-from class each day, but it also ensures that students have a reliable way to travel to work, the
grocery store, doctor and therapist appointments, and so much more.
The Big Payback is an important reminder of the power of community. Together, we are capable of so much! We simply
could not do what we do for students each day without your help. Thank you for your generosity and support of our
mission and work!
The Big Payback Delivers
for Nashville State Foundation
Comcast Cares Day Builds Community at NSCC
The Nashville State Foundation hosted its first-ever Comcast
Cares Day project on April 18th. NSCC faculty and staff, with their
friends and families, joined volunteers from Comcast and the
community to contribute to an ongoing revitalization project at the
greenhouse space on the College’s White Bridge Road Campus.
NSCC’s greenhouse provides service learning opportunities for
students and delivers an important community resource through
the College’s partnership with The Nashville Food Project. TNFP
helps address food disparity by recovering and growing food
that can be shared with food-insecure individuals throughout the
Nashville area, and the Nashville State greenhouse serves as a
transplant garden for seedlings that are later moved into TNFP’s
outdoor garden plots.
Comcast Cares Day volunteers cleared weeds, planted perennials
and shrubs, laid down mulch, and helped with cleanup, beautifying
the greenhouse space inside and out. Projects like these build
community at Nashville State while allowing us to better serve the
community at large. We are grateful for the dedicated volunteers
who made this project possible and look forward to another
awesome project next year!
It’s hard to picture a Nashville State without Ted
Washington. Ted started his career at the College in 1977,
and was a fixture at the White Bridge Road Campus for
nearly 41 years. Ted met his wife, Deborah, at Nashville
State while the two attended accounting classes together.
They were married in November of 1977 shortly after
Ted graduated. Two weeks later in December, Ted began
working at the College as a programmer in the Computer
Services Division. Throughout his tenure, Ted held a variety
of positions at the College but spent the last ten years
of his career serving as the Associate Vice President of
Institutional Research where he provided support for
institutional and departmental assessment, ensured the
integrity of data resources, and developed data needed
to guide College decision-making. On July 21, 2018, Ted
lost his battle with pancreatic cancer. Deborah contacted
the Foundation to establish a scholarship to honor Ted’s
memory. An outpouring of support soon followed from
faculty, staff, and friends to create the Ted M. Washington
Memorial Endowed Scholarship to help male NSCC
students with demonstrated financial need. Through this
award, Ted’s legacy lives on here at Nashville State. We are
grateful to have worked with such a kind man who was
truly a hero to all who knew him.
Not All Heroes Wear Capes
Sarah Roberts,
Dean, Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics
NSCC student Jordan Carson celebrates receiving the
Ted Washington Scholarship with NSCC President Dr. Shanna
L. Jackson and Deborah Washington
“Not a week goes by that I don’t think about
Ted and say a prayer of thanksgiving that I
had him in my life. His memory will always
influence me, and many others at Nashville
State, in a positive and productive way.”
Like many college students in the Tennessee Promise
Program, Demetre Ridley’s transition from high school to
college was difficult at times. Navigating the waters of
higher education introduced new challenges like finding
transportation to and from class, getting to know a new
campus, and adjusting to the rigors of college-level
coursework, among many others. However, he attributes
much of his success at Nashville State to being part of a
tight-knit community and benefitting from opportunities
to learn outside the classroom.
Prior to graduating as part of the Class of 2019, Demetre
was a member of the Nashville State Kung Fu Society and
the NSCC Jazz Ensemble, which was recently honored
by DownBeat Magazine as the nation’s top community
college band in the rock/jazz/pop category. As a music
student at Nashville State, Demetre attended multiple
on-campus workshops with award-winning musicians
like Roy Wooten, Aaron Scherz, and Tracy Silverman.
The Nashville State Foundation underwrites student-
centered workshops like these and supports student
groups like the Kung Fu Society through our Faculty &
Staff Grant Program, which helps faculty and staff enhance
educational opportunities for their students.
Demetre emphasizes that working with professional
musicians helped him hone his craft while learning about
the business and operational side of music, and he credits
Faculty and Staff Grant Program Brings a Sense
of Community to Nashville State
Demetre practices for an upcoming Kung Fu competition.
the Kung Fu Society with helping him master life skills
like punctuality and self-discipline. “These experiences
taught me the reality of what being a musician is and
life lessons that will help me in my future. Without them,
my educational journey would not have been nearly as
impactful or enjoyable.” He plans to continue his studies at
Middle Tennessee State University, where he will pursue a
degree in Vocal/General Music Education. With a passion
for music and children, Demetre aspires to one day teach
music to elementary students in the Metro Nashville Public
School System – many of whom may go on to study right
here at Nashville State.
NSCC educates more than 25% of Metro
Nashville Public Schools’ graduates, but many
drop out before completing their degrees. Research
has demonstrated that finances often play a role in a
student’s decision to abandon their studies, but lack of
connection with a campus community can be just as
influential in a student’s decision not to return. Demetre’s
positive experience at Nashville State was amplified by
the connections he made with faculty, the relationships he
built with his fellow students, and the real-life experiences
he gained through learning from local professional
musicians. We are proud to support projects that help
students feel at home at Nashville State and keep them
engaged in their studies. Every student deserves the
opportunity, like Demetre, to find his or her #NSCCFamily.
“These experiences
taught me the
reality of what being
a musician is and
life lessons that will
help me in my future.
Without them, my
educational journey
would not have been
nearly as impactful or
enjoyable.”