The Power of Bequests, Strengthening Financial Aid

Irma Schachter ’49 P’78 GP’15 was a lifelong supporter of Connecticut College. She made gifts to her beloved alma mater every year after she graduated, most recently through IRA rollover distributions to the Connecticut College fund at the 1911 Society level.

In honor of the graduation of her granddaughter Lillie ’15, Irma established the Dr. Abraham A. and Rose Gilstein Klein Scholarship Fund—named after her parents who supported her education. Irma expressed appreciation for the letters she received from her scholarship fund recipients and also for the regular engagements with staff at the College.

In later years Irma was even more strategic in her philanthropy, making gifts of appreciated securities from her IRA and working closely with her financial advisor.

Planning your giving to the College in a thoughtful way, as Irma did, can be incredibly impactful. Her plan to establish a scholarship fund during her lifetime and then naming the scholarship in her estate plan, which she told us about in advance, more than doubled the scholarship and enhanced support to students in need.

Granddaughter Lillie Schachter ’15 remembers, “I will forever be grateful to Irma for sharing her love of Connecticut College with me. She told me once that with her having lived in Burdick and me living in Smith, I was living in her shadow—which wasn’t great to hear, Grandma! But it sure did make her laugh.” We are so grateful to Irma, who passed away in May of 2023, and to her family for her incredible generosity to Connecticut College.