Groton School surpasses 10+10 fundraising goal with $20 million honoring the Maqubela legacy

Groton School surpassed a major fundraising goal this past week, reporting that $20 million has been raised in gifts and pledges in honor of Vuyelwa and Temba Maqubela for key strategic initiatives aimed at controlling tuition costs, expanding summer enrichment options, and improving inclusion, belonging, and student well-being.

In September 2022, Groton received an anonymous lead gift to celebrate the Maqubelas’ tenth year on the Circle and to take on the school’s strategic goal of creating a more inclusive campus by kickstarting funding for construction of a new track and athletic fields. When a goal of $10 million in major gifts—representing the Maqubelas’ decade at Groton—was set and and quickly met, the challenge expanded to a 10+10 campaign, seeking a new goal of $20 million for the track and for bolstering the endowments of the GRAIN (GRoton Affordability and INclusion) initiative and the GRACE (GRoton Accelerate Challenge Enrich) summer program. 

In response to the Groton community’s continued eagerness to honor the Maqubelas and a level of generosity that produced a fundraising pace of nearly $1.6 million a month, that $20 million goal was met this past week.

“I am truly grateful for the incredible support this campaign has received from the global Groton family over the past fifteen months,” said Board of Trustees President Benjamin Pyne ’77, P’12, ’15. “It speaks volumes about the positive impact that the Maqubelas have had on Groton during their first ten years here, and shows how our community at large has overwhelmingly acknowledged and embraced the power of inclusion.”

Adopted by the Board of Trustees in November 2014 as the school’s number-one priority, GRAIN froze tuition for four years and allowed for moderate increases in other years, while expanding the number of students receiving financial assistance and guaranteeing that Groton School would consider all applicants without regard to their ability to pay. As a result, the school’s tuition—the highest among forty peer schools in 2014–15—is now lowest, and Groton is recognized as a leader among independent schools in inclusion and tuition containment.

 

To date, $86 million of a larger $100 million goal has been raised to support GRAIN and GRAIN 2.0.

 

Now in its eighth year, GRACE continues to grow, welcoming its largest in-person enrollment this past summer. The program is designed to propel students to advanced classes and to fill preparation gaps during the summer before Upper School, offering a variety of courses—along with a healthy dose of recreation and art—to rising Fourth Formers. As educators across the world work to catch up from learning loss exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, GRACE’s model for identifying and closing such gaps has proven prescient. To date, $4 million of the targeted $10 million GRACE endowment has been raised.

 

Groton’s Strategic Framework 2030 focuses on inclusion, belonging, and student well-being. Since track and field is a global sport that requires little prior experience, it represents an opportunity for students of all backgrounds to compete in rewarding physical activity that contributes to each of those three goals. In addition, track and field is already one of the fastest-growing sports at Groton, with participation increasing 44 percent from 2014 to 2022—despite the fact that Groton runners, throwers, and jumpers cannot compete on campus and have to travel to a facility in a neighboring town just to practice. 

 

The Maqubela Track and Field includes an eight-lane track that can accommodate every event in high school competition, including shot put, discus, javelin, long jump, triple jump, high jump, and pole vault. A natural grass soccer/lacrosse field will sit in the infield.

 

Construction of the track and field facility broke ground this past spring and is near completion, with Groton student-athletes scheduled to use it starting spring 2024. 

 

“Vuyelwa and I are humbled by the overwhelming response to a mini-campaign that benefits children directly and in perpetuity at Groton,” said Headmaster Temba Maqubela. “Not many Thanksgiving gifts surpass those given to the education of other people’s children. This is the root of Ubuntu.”