Alva J. Field Trust Crosses $5 Million Milestone -- December 18, 2016

This is pretty cool. Both my brother and I received financial assistance from the Alva J Field Memorial Trust Scholarship Program. The Williston Herald is reporting:

The trust has been giving scholarships out since 2009, according to F. Dan Baker, who administers the trust. Any Williams County student with a grade point average of 3.0 or better is eligible for a scholarship, and it can be applied no matter where the student goes to college.

Baker just finished sending out notifications to students who earned the scholarships for the spring 2017 semester, and the trust gave away about $600,000. Before that, it had given out a total of about $4.6 million, bringing the grand total to more than $5 million.

Background:

The trust gets its name from Alva Field, who came to Williston in the early 20th century. He died in 1933, and his wife, Maude Field, established the trust in his honor before her death in 1959.

The trust didn’t get any money, Baker said. Instead, Maude Field left about 2,000 acres of land, with the income from that funding loans for Williams County students who wanted to attend college.

Then this:

For 50 years, the program just gave out loans, but over the years, some land was sold and oil wells were put on other parcels.

As more money came it, the three people who administer the trust wanted to do more for students. In addition to Baker, who is the managing director, Michael Campbell, superintendent of Williston Public School District No. 1, and Martin Hanson, the Williams County Commissioner who serves as Williams County Welfare Official, sit on the trust’s board. 

That explains it. The program is called a "scholarship" program, but I know that both my brother and I had loans, so I was confused when I first saw the headline.

Great story. Everything now makes sense.

The great Williston superintendent Mr Leon Olson was the individual who interviewed me for the loa and with whom I subsequently corresponded when paying back the loan. 

The fact that the program changed from a "loan" program to a "scholarship" program tells me that a) the program was very well managed; and, b) Williams County students pay back their loans.