The 1970 Campaign for West Point: Status Report as of February 2020

                         The 1970 Campaign for West Point:                     
Status Report as of February 2020

To: 1970 Brothers in the Long Gray Line and Friends of the Class

The Class of 1970 Cyber Leaders Conference is a reality!  Thanks to your generosity, as of the end of January, we officially passed the $2.5 million dollar goal to endow this great legacy gift.  This is a noteworthy tribute to our class and is much appreciated by our Alma Mater.  We are working to finalize all contractual details with the Association of Graduates and the Army Cyber Institute, and LTG(R) Rhett Hernandez (head of the ACI) will brief us on the timing and scope of the Conference at our Class business meeting during the reunion.  Congratulations to each of you.

Having said that, the 50^th Reunion Gift Campaign is not over – it will continue until our reunion.  We have 2 more opportunities: to achieve the stretch goal of 88% participation and to to fund (most if not all) of the two contingency gifts.   Those gifts are: (1) Endowment of the MacArthur Cup and (2) a contribution to jumpstart the Revoutionary War Site Restoration/Augmented Reality Staff Ride.  More to follow on these topics.

Financial Status of the Campaign.  As mentioned, we have surpassed the financial target of $2.5 million and Bill Cater (our Class CFO) and I have made an attempt to estimate our current overage.  It is not easy to estimate the exact amount of our overage at this time, for a variety of reasons.  What we can say for certain (as confirmed by AOG campaign data) is that we have surpassed the primary $2.5 million target. If we are successful in raising additional funding before the campaign ends in May, we will be able to not only fund the Cyber Leaders Conference, we will be able to fund both contingency gifts – a truly remarkable legacy for our class.  As our campaign continues to evolve, we will have the unique opportunity to make a significant contribution as the “lead class” in support of the Army’s (and the Nation’s) celebration that will take place in the year 2025.

If you have not yet contributed, or wish to increase your pledge, please consider doing so.  Be assured that any additional funds collected beyond this date will go toward funding the contingency gifts.  As we get closer to the reunion (sometime in April) I will publish one last email to the class which will include an Executive Committee recommendation concening the contingency gifts.

Participation Rates.  The current participation rate for the campaign for our class is at 82%, which is the second highest ever recorded by AOG for a reunion gift campaign – this is another remarkable achievement.  We set a stretch goal of 88% which was attained by the Class of 1964 and the highest recorded by AOG.  Please see the “stoplight chart” below.  This chart has been distributed to our Regimental and Company campaign reps for the past several months to help us track participation rate progress.  As you can see from the legend, is shows company participation rate (within a range) from Blue to Red.  As of the end of January, 23 companies are either Blue or Green (with 5 companies at 100% participation) and 13 companies are Yellow or Red.  Fourth Regiment has an overall participation rate of 90% showing that the stretch goal is achievable. This chart has shown steady improvement since we first started using it over 2 years ago.

On behalf of both the Executive Committee and the Gift Selection Committee, I thank you for your support to out reunion gift campaign.

Serve With Integrity,

Steve Strom,

Class Giving Officer