University of the Ozarks President Richard Dunsworth speaks Monday about the Walton Family Foundation's $10 million gift that will establish a new scholarship program.
University of the Ozarks announced on Monday a $10 million endowment from the Walton Family Foundation in Bentonville that will establish the Frontier Scholarship Program to assist promising students from low- and middle-income families.
In a news release, University President Richard L. Dunsworth said the scholarships would boost the private, four-year school’s efforts to provide a liberal arts education to students who might otherwise struggle to afford it.
The first scholarships will be awarded to 16 students entering as freshmen in the fall of 2017. About 60 students will be enrolled in the scholarship program by 2020, the university said.
The Bentonville-based foundation was established by the late Sam and Helen Walton. Helen Walton joined the university’s board of trustees in 1974, was a former chair of the board, and was named honorary lifetime chair of the board in 1985.
University of the Ozarks is a host school for the Walton International Scholars Program, and is the home of the Walton Fine Arts Center and Robson Memorial Library, which was named in the memory of Helen Walton’s parents.
The university’s fall 2016 enrollment is 686, up 5.4 percent, and it will provide more than $8.8 million in institutional financial aid to students this school year, according to the news release.
The Frontier Scholarship endowment is the latest in a string of major gifts and commitments to the university that includes funding for the complete restoration of the university’s Munger-Wilson Memorial Chapel, the $2 million McElree Faculty Enrichment Endowment, a $1 million endowed math professorship, an $800,000 endowment for study abroad scholarships and funding to build and support a new competition tennis complex.
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