Every year, I watch with joy as the Alumni Board presents a “big check” to the student body at our annual Alumni Awards and Golden Eagles chapel. This year’s “big check” — presented on Feb. 24 — was both figurative and literal as it totaled over $4.1 million from alumni giving. Wow!

What an amazing blessing and impact your gifts have been to our students and to The Campaign for Biola University. Your gifts are making a difference in so many ways: scholarships; a new science, technology and health building; athletic facilities; several new academic centers; and the extension of our classroom teaching around the world. I want to extend our thanks to all of you who have given on behalf of the future generations that will benefit from the education they will receive in this place.

For those of us who have been around Biola for more than a decade or so (I’m getting ready to enter my fourth decade at Biola!), we are truly amazed at the outpouring of support and participation that we are experiencing from the Biola family through this campaign. As you have been reading about or are experiencing with us, there are some real changes taking place — both to the look of the campus and to the academic programs that are being taught here. And it is the support of our friends and partners in education that are making all of these amazing improvements possible. We are enjoying the opportunity to show those changes to anyone visiting campus and to many of you who are seeing the changes for the first time through a “virtual visit” during our Campaign National Tour events.

Speaking of which, it has also been amazing to meet so many of you as we have taken the campaign on the road throughout the United States. In the coming months, we will be visiting several more cities with President Barry H. Corey and speakers from Biola. At each stop, they’re sharing the exciting news of all that’s happening here and through our alumni around the world. If you live anywhere near Dallas, Portland, Denver, Chicago or Los Angeles, I encourage you to join us later this fall when we come to your town for an evening of fun and excitement. I think you will enjoy the evening and come away with feelings of excitement and gratitude for how God is blessing this place and our faculty and students.

For more information on the campaign or the Campaign National Tour events, go to giving.biola.edu/campaign.

On behalf of all of us in the alumni office, thank you for your faithfulness in service to Christ’s kingdom. We are proud to be, with you, Biola Alumni for Life!