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UGA car tags pave the way for students

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The 60,000 active UGA license plates display Bulldog pride to the world, but they also support scholarships for UGA students.

Every new or renewed UGA license plate in the state of Georgia raises money for need-based scholarships. For each “Power G” tag on the road, $10 annually funds scholarships through the University of Georgia Foundation. With over 11,000 UGA students applying for financial aid in the 2020-2021 academic year alone, every new and renewed tag addresses a pressing need.

“This partnership between UGA and the state of Georgia has resulted in millions of dollars’ worth of scholarship support for UGA students,” said Evan Tighe, senior director of annual and special giving at UGA. “This decreases the financial burden for many of our students and lowers the barriers that might otherwise prevent them from attending.”

Annually, Georgia’s license plate program generates an average of over $600,000 in scholarship funding for UGA, said Chris Spruill, assistant director of gift accounting for the UGA Foundation. That money is divided equally into two funds: an endowed fund that invests contributions and pulls scholarship awards from the fund’s annual return, and a non-endowed fund that pulls awards from the total fund amount. This allows for a balance of current support and long-term growth of the perpetual scholarship fund.

The funds together support an average of 330 awards per year in amounts just over $1,000, and UGA students have received a total of 3,562 scholarship awards over the life of the program.

Bulldogs in Alabama, North Carolina, South Carolina and Texas can represent UGA in their states, too, and two ongoing campaigns are working to bring UGA license plates to Florida and Tennessee.

The level of support the UGA Foundation receives from programs in other states differs, but every plate on the road helps increase UGA’s visibility and helps reinforce a sense of community for Bulldogs outside Georgia.

More information on each state’s license plate program and how to get involved can be found on the UGA Alumni site’s license plate page.