Bobcat Society

All in for Our Students!

The Bobcat Society recognizes and rewards our outstanding COCC faculty, staff and retirees who give to the COCC Foundation through one-time gifts or payroll donations in support of students and the College.

Join the Bobcat Society

The faculty, staff and retiree giving campaign.

As faculty and staff, you invest your time and talent in COCC and our students every day. When you extend your contributions to include philanthropy, you express your belief in COCC’s mission and actively support our long-standing culture of excellence!

Please join us in support of our students by making a gift today to the COCC Foundation. Faculty and staff participation play an important role in ensuring COCC's success, as well as influencing gifts from corporations and foundations, who often consider faculty and staff giving rates when determining their own support for COCC.

Faculty & Staff Giving Opportunities

Listed below are the three giving opportunities for faculty and staff.

1. COCC Bobcat Scholarship Fund

This fund supports annual scholarships for students in any program at COCC. The recipients of this fund have financial need and show promise and dedication, demonstrated through their scholarship application. A gift to this fund ensures that qualified and deserving students get the financial support that they need to succeed this year.

2. COCC Staff Endowed Scholarship Fund

This endowed fund was created in 1998 to perpetually support student scholarships at COCC. This fund has grown through the generosity of past and current staff and faculty. A gift to this fund ensures that scholarship support will be available to deserving COCC students in perpetuity. Recipients of these funds have financial need and show promise and dedication, demonstrated through their scholarship application.

3. COCC Student Emergency Fund

College students are masters of thrifty solutions: finding free movie nights, shopping around for books, and living off instant noodles. But sometimes, an expense comes up that can't be avoided. Examples are: unexpected transportation issues, housing crisis, threat of utility shut off or childcare costs. That's where these emergency funds come in. These funds keep students in school, preventing them from dropping out due to a short-term financial crisis. Students in financial crisis submit an application and provide verification. Requests for emergency funding is reviewed by an internal committee and if approved, funds are expeditiously available for the student.

Ways to Give

+ Payroll Donation

Setting up an automatic payroll donation is the easiest way to consistently give to the COCC Foundation:

Payroll donations are deducted monthly from your paycheck
Reduces administrative costs for the COCC Foundation because there are no processing fees involved
Allows you to spread your support over the course of a year, in smaller, more financially manageable amounts
Payroll donations come from your after-tax earnings and you can deduct the total annual donated amount!
You get to feel good helping COCC students each month!

Download and fill out thePayroll Donation & Deduction Formand return to the COCC Foundation for processing.

+ One-Time Gift

A one-time gift to the COCC Foundation is greatly appreciated:

Your gift is tax-deductible
There are many ways to give a one-time gift: check, cash, credit card, retirement account distributions, and appreciated stock.
Your donation will go directly to supporting students in need at COCC

Visit theDonation Pageto make a one-time gift

为什么给?

+Does my gift really make a difference?

Yes! The more people who choose to give, the greater the collective impact will be. In 2020-21, more than 125 staff, faculty and retirees made gifts to the COCC Foundation, totaling $390,000 in support!But there is still unmet need in providing deserving students with financial support - this year 40% of qualified applicants were not awarded a scholarship because of available funding.Every gift makes a collective difference in helping to provide more support - whether it be $5 a month or $100 -gifts of all sizes truly make a difference!

+我在COCC工作，为什么我也要给学院捐款?

Gifts to the COCC Foundation have a powerful effect on COCC’s ability to remain an affordable and top-tier institution.It is hard to ask the community to support COCC students if we don’t believe in our work enough to invest in it ourselves.Corporations and private foundations often look for high-levels of support from our faculty and staff when making funding decisions, as well.

Please note:The COCC Foundation is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization and all gifts are tax-deductible.

+ Students pay tuition. Why does COCC need charitable support?

It may be surprising, but tuition and fees account for only about one-quarter of the actual cost of an education at COCC.Students who receive a tuition and fees scholarship can direct their other financial resources toward the other education costs, like books, transportation, equipment, exams or certifications.The fullcost of attendanceat COCC varies from $14,247 - $20,823 annually.

Tom Barry

"Scholarships open the doors to higher education that might otherwise be closed. For the recipient, a scholarship may be the gift that opens up the opportunity to explore and achieve personal and career aspirations. I support the Foundation and its mission of increasing access to higher education and, in the process, transforming lives.

支持基金会支持学生和我们的社区。这是简单的数学，对吧?The more contributions to the Foundation, the more contributions to students, the more contributions to our community."

Cindy Jeffreys

“这是你能用你的钱进行的最好的投资之一。虽然你投资的回报不是更多的钱，但它是更好的——在那些被你的慷慨帮助的人的心中和微笑中。没有比这更好的了。

我想没有人会反对听我们的奖学金获得者的证词让你感觉有多好。但当你知道你为奖学金基金捐款帮助他们实现目标时，这些证词让你达到了一个全新的水平。

To top it all off our COCC Payroll Deduction Plan makes it so easy. You only have to think about it once a year! I think I started with a deduction amount of $10. (Two cups coffee a month!) The next year, after we received our annual raise, I increased my donation $5... and so on year after year. Doing that you don't even notice a reduction in your income!"