The $400 million campaign is the most ambitious in the University's history and focuses on bolstering the many elements that make McMaster great: the faculty and staff who impart knowledge and encourage innovative learning, the groundbreaking research, the state-of-the-art facilities, and at the heart of McMaster, the students.

The McMaster Community Campaign provides faculty and staff an opportunity to support these important initiatives with a personal gift. Annual support from faculty and staff is vital to ensuring the University's students, staff and faculty reach their ambitious goals. Past gifts from faculty and staff have helped augment a wide range of initiatives including financial aid, research and construction.

The goal of the 2008-2009 Community Campaign is to receive donations from 25 per cent of faculty and staff before April 30, 2009.

"As faculty and staff, we know from firsthand experience the impact that a scholarship or bursary, or access to a new learning style, or the availability of a critical resource can have on a student's university career, says Judy Major-Girardin, associate professor in the School of the Arts. "Making a donation is one of the avenues we have at our disposal to help enhance these opportunities and ensure success is possible."

Major-Girardin joined forces with five other staff and faculty as part of the 2008-2009 Community Campaign Committee. The committee was established to share their messages of support throughout the campaign and to ask colleagues to join them in this initiative.

The 2008-2009 Community Campaign Committee includes:

Jason Cole, Director, Human Resources Integrated Strategies, Human Resources Services

Vivian Lewis, Associate University Librarian, Organizational Analysis, Plannning & Accountability

Marvin Gunderman, Technical Coordinator, Insect Taxonomist and Instructor, Department of Biology

Lynda Bentley Poole, Assistant Professor and Level 1 Chair School of Nursing

Román Viveros-Aguilera, Professor and Coordinator of the Graduate Program in Statistics, Department of Mathematics and Statistics

Judy Major-Girardin, Associate Professor, School of the Arts

Gifts may be designated to any area that McMaster faculty and staff feel passionately about, whether that is The Campaign for McMaster University, a faculty project, scholarship and bursaries, cancer research, the list goes on. Strong support from McMaster's faculty and staff sends a positive message to the University's alumni and friends as they consider making a personal gift to McMaster.

Gifts can be made conveniently and securely on-line at givetomcmaster.ca.