GRANVILLE -- Denison University has been awarded a grant of $3 million by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation on the occasion of the retirement of the Foundation's president, William G. Bowen. The grant honors Bowen and his wife, Mary Ellen Maxwell Bowen, both 1955 graduates of Denison. Bowen, president of the Mellon Foundation from 1988 to 2006 and previously president of Princeton University, served for 17 years as an active member of Denison's Board and continues as a Life Trustee.

William G. Bowen '55

The grant recognizes Dr. and Mrs. Bowen's lifelong commitment to excellence in undergraduate education, and will be used to create the William G. Bowen and Mary Ellen Bowen Endowed Fund at Denison University. The Fund will endow two purposes: a named professorship and a scholarship fund. The William G. Bowen Distinguished Professorship will honor faculty achievement at the highest level in teaching, scholarship, and community service. Holders of the Professorship will come either from within the current faculty or outside it and may represent any academic field. The nomination process for the new Professorship will be carried out during the current academic year, with the announcement of the first appointee to the position coming next fall.

The second initiative made possible by the Mellon grant will be the William G. Bowen and Mary Ellen Bowen Research Scholarships for students. The Scholarships will endow summer research opportunities for students under Denison's longstanding Summer Scholars Program, the College's flagship initiative in faculty-mentored student research. Under the program, faculty-student teams collaborate intensively during the summer on scientific, scholarly, or artistic projects. About 125 faculty-student pairs participate in the program each year, and the Bowen Research Scholarships will provide permanent funding for eleven or more of these opportunities. Each Bowen Scholarship recipient will receive a stipend of $3,300 plus housing and other expenses for the 10-week summer session. In addition, each student's faculty mentor will receive a stipend.

"We are thrilled and honored that Denison is the institution through which the Mellon Foundation has chosen to recognize our alumni Bill and Mary Ellen Bowen," said Denison President Dale T. Knobel. "The Bowens themselves are stellar examples of lives shaped by the liberal arts. And The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation is one of the nation's foremost advocates for liberal arts colleges. We are deeply grateful for Bill Bowen's lifelong leadership in education and for the generous way in which the Mellon Foundation has celebrated it."

Based in New York, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation is a private philanthropic institution, with assets of approximately $5 billion, that makes grants on a selective basis to institutions of higher education, independent libraries, centers for advanced study, museums, art conservation, and performing arts organizations.

Denison University, located in Granville, Ohio, was founded in 1831 and is a privately supported, coeducational college of liberal arts and sciences, offering three different bachelor's degrees (B.A., B.S., and B.F.A.) among more than 40 majors and concentrations. Some 2,100 full-time undergraduate students represent 47 states and 34 foreign countries. Denison is fully accredited by the North Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools and is a founding member of the North Coast Athletic Conference. Denison's chapter of Phi Beta Kappa was founded in 1910. Dale T. Knobel is Denison's 19th president.

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