Attending college often requires thousands of dollars, but it could be cheaper for a few local high schoolers, thanks to the Lake Martin Auburn Club.
In 2022, the local Auburn University alumni association raised nearly $110,000 in scholarships for area youth. Club president Neal Butler described the accomplishment as a testament to Tallapoosa County residents’ generosity.
“The primary reason that we do this is to assist kids who otherwise may have a difficult time financing college,” Butler said. “We definitely want to try to support and encourage children to kids that are graduating here in our area to go to college, with Auburn being the one that we're representing.”
He initially graduated Auburn University with the Class of 1975 and has continued to support his alma mater ever since. Butler said his blood, however, runs just as deep with Lake Martin as the Auburn Tigers.
“As far as the lake, my wife and I built our first lake home here about 31 years ago,” he said. “We've lived all over the place, but we always had the lake home here. We've been permanent residents since 2014.”
In fact, he said the Lake Martin Auburn Club raised enough scholarship funds to receive a distinguished honor. The Auburn University Alumni Club recently endowed the club with a 2022 Scholarship Program of the Year award for the efforts of the club’s roughly 275 members.
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“The Auburn University Alumni Club gives five awards each year,” Butler said. “This award goes to the club that raises the most scholarship money, and we won out of 147 clubs throughout the country.”
The club represents Auburn graduates from Tallapoosa, Coosa and Hale counties; Auburn University will distribute the funds throughout the tri-county area to eligible students.
According to Butler, the Auburn University Alumni Club distributes $85,000 of the funds while the remaining amount is given directly to local high school students in the form of scholarships for them to attend Auburn.
The club initially collected the funds throughout 2022 with a mirror of events, including an annual dinner and golf tournament. However, Butler said they never imagined such a beneficial outcome.
“We weren't anticipating nor expecting it so it was a nice surprise, but we get a great deal of satisfaction out of knowing how many scholarships we have given and how much money we've given to scholarships,” he said. “Our goal is to raise scholarship funds for local kids. Everything else is secondary.”
