NIAF SCHOLARSHIP and GRANT PROGRAMS 1981–2001

Scholarship Program

This program, under Dr. Maria Lombardo's tutelage, grew from $250 scholarships to $10,000 scholarships and an endowment of 1.9 million dollars. In 2001 she brought in 2 contracts of 3.6 million dollars from the Mott Foundation and 1.5 million dollars from the De Francis Scholarship Endowment.

The scholarship program was successful because it was a custom tailored program to carry out the wishes of donors (individuals, organizations, companies) who wanted students of certain regions, geographic areas and who were academically worthy but financially needy. Eventually a community service component was added to the requirements. The Scholarship Review Committee was responsible for the selection of scholarship winners, on a yearly basis. Some of the Scholarship winners were presented to the community at NIAF's Education Luncheon held in conjunction with NIAF's Gala Dinner and at regional local events. Yearly, scholarship monies were raised directly by Dr. Lombardo or indirectly as she helped others to raise scholarship funds since all NIAF events were held to benefit the NIAF Scholarship program. Lombardo initiated the idea of matching scholarship funds with other organizations. One of the first scholarship sponsors was the DeFlavia family. In 1981, Mr. and Mrs. Natale De Flavia of Pennsylvania bequeathed one third of their estate to the NIAF to provide scholarships for needy Italian American students. Mr. DeFlavia made this provision for scholarships because he believed that "no one should be denied an education because of lack of funds." To this he added, "We feel it would be the humanitarian thing to establish a scholarship fund for Italian American boys and girls." Mr. DeFlavia felt strongly about the importance of scholarships because a senatorial scholarship had enabled him to attend Temple University during his days of economic hardship. The same enthusiasm that the DeFlavias had for the NIAF Scholarship Program continues. For thirteen years, the Marinelli Family Fellowship was kept alive by the late John and M. Concetta Marinelli's daughters, Angela and Anne. It continues today, thanks to late Michael and Antonio Marinelli, cousins of Angela and Anne.

Scholarships were always the focus of NIAF concerned with the education of young people who will become tomorrow's leaders. To meet the immediate and long-range needs of qualified Italian-American students, the NIAF offered a variety of scholarship assistance in business, law, medicine, education, music, etc. Funds were made available by the private contributions of NIAF supporters, Italian American organizations, private firms and the annual income generated by the NIAF Scholarship Fund.

Students completed the general requirements of the application form and those specified in categories #1-82. Criteria for selection included academic merit and financial need. Winners were selected by the NIAF's Scholarship Review Committee.

Those students selected as winners were presented their awards locally and nationally and were invited to assist NIAF regional vice presidents. Students are also recognized in the press. There are many examples of students presented locally. In conjunction with Bruno Fusco and Holy Rosary Church, NIAF collaborated in matching a scholarship for Italian American students. Students were presented their awards at a formal dinner in which there were cadets from the Annapolis Naval Academy to honor the winners.

Grant Program

Over the years, Lombardo conducted a multitude of educational programs that were models for the community. To assist individuals organizations and educational institutions to conduct similar programs, Lombardo urged NIAF to establish a grant program through its Education Committee. Applicants were encouraged to obtain matching funds, funds from outside the NIAF. The NIAF Education Committee made their selections yearly.

The Goals of the NIAF Grant Program were to:

• Preserve the Italian American heritage
• Promote the Italian language and Italian culture in America
• Inform the public through various media about the Italian American heritage, accomplishments of Italian Americans, issues of concern to Americans of Italian decent and the ties between the United States and Italy
• Develop new information on social cultural economic and ethnic characteristics of Italian Americans
• Foster inter-connections among the Italian American community

- NIAF published the first issue of "The Scholarship Gazette" in the Spring osf 1988. The first article published in the Gazette was the survey that Lombardo conducted of past scholarship winners. The purpose of the survey was to identify "Where are They Now?"

- In conjuction with the conference Preserving and Promoting the Italian Language in the United states, Dr. Lombardo asked 2,000 students on how the Italian language was maintained in their homes and schools and their ideas for promoting Italian in the future.