Funding for five new endowed professorships at the University of Louisiana was completed last week with $200,000 from the Louisiana Board of Regents. These funds will be matched with private donations to UL Lafayette as part of the Regents’ Endowed Chairs for
Eminent Scholars and Endowed Professorships program.

The state match and the private funds will create five $100,000 professorships. The state match comes from the Louisiana Education Quality Support Fund, enerated through a permanent trust fund approved by voters in a 1986 constitutional amendment. The original $540 million payment was part of a settlement between the state and federal governments over offshore oil and gas money.

To create an endowed professorship, a college or university must first raise at least $60,000 from private contributions, which then makes it eligible to receive the Regents’ $40,000 match.

UL's endowments which were recently matched include: the Charles and Vicki Milam/BORSF Endowed Professorship in Business Administration, the Dr. James D. Wilson/BORSF Memorial Endowed Professorship in Southern Studies, the Lockheed Martin Corporation/BORSF Endowed Professorship in Computer Sciences/Computer Engineering III, the Midsouth Bank/BORSF Endowed Professorship in Economics, and The Whitney National Bank/BORSF Endowed Professorship in Economics.