Westmont College Creates New Endowed Chair

Westmont College has received $1.5 million, to be used toward the creation of their first endowed chair for the social sciences. Of this money, $1 million was awarded by the Fletcher Jones Foundation, a Los Angeles-based organization dedicated to supporting private colleges and universities throughout California. This grant was then matched with a $500,000 gift from an anonymous source.

Every three to five years the Fletcher Jones Foundation Chair will be awarded to a different faculty member in Westmont’s history, sociology and anthropology, kinesiology, economics and business, education, liberal arts, or political science departments, or in the Urban Program. This professor will be granted an annual stipend and will teach one less class per year in order to aid them in their research.

The grant is intended to enrich Westmont by expanding its research capabilities, in addition to honoring faulty members for their “distinguished teaching, scholarly efforts and personal investment in students,” according to the college’s president Gayle Beebe in a press release. While the college currently has four endowed chairs, the Fletcher Jones Foundation Chair will be the first covering the social sciences.