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Stamps School Giving Priorities

Together, we can ensure that the Stamps School will always be a place where creative passions are ignited, where talented students are empowered by exceptional faculty and where working across disciplines illuminates innovative solutions to new knowledge and global problems. Now more than ever, the world needs our transdisciplinary collaborators, global citizens, and artists and designers who will make a difference.

Join us in our com­mit­ment to the artists and design­ers of tomor­row by sup­port­ing these strategic priorities to advance our mission of pre­paring stu­dents to think in new ways, to edu­cate them to become con­cerned world cit­i­zens, and to equip them with the skills for life-long accomplishment.

Student Support

Ensuring sufficient financial support for our students in the form of scholarships, international travel grants, emergency funds and career development opportunities.

Stamps scholarship recipients speak about their passion for art and the power of faculty mentorship.
  • Student Scholarship

    The Alumni and Friends Scholarship Fund provides an opportunity for donors to have an immediate impact on student support. Students who have demonstrated exceptional academic performance or exceptional creative potential as evidenced by their portfolios can receive scholarships to lessen financial burdens of a college education.

  • The Big Idea Award: Penny W. Stamps Tribute Fund

    In December of 2018, our school’s namesake and friend, Penny W. Stamps, passed away after a battle with cancer. A proud University of Michigan alumna (BS.Des. ’66), arts advocate, and leader, Penny’s legacy lives on in the research and creative practice that happens every day at the Stamps School of Art & Design. Join us in celebrating Penny's life and legacy through a gift to the Penny W. Stamps Tribute Fund: this fund supports the Big Idea Award, which provides one Stamps senior funding to help launch a major, ambitious project after graduation.

  • Emergency Funding

    The Stamps Student Emergency Fund allows us to help art & design students who encounter unexpected emergencies during their degree program and those who are feeling the financial impacts of COVID-19. Whether it's to cover costs associated with housing, emergency travel, food expenses, technology access, medical and dental expenses, or other one-time unanticipated expenses, this fund helps our students in their greatest times of need.

  • International Experience

    “Becoming an artist/designer is about altering your perspective. It’s also about understanding the context of your creative work in relation to the world around you. There’s no better way to learn this than immersing yourself in another culture.”
    - Sandra Wiley, Director of International Study Programs

    The Stamps School is the only unit at the University that requires students to participate in an international experience. The International Initiatives Fund helps defray the cost of international travel by providing need-based travel, passport, and accommodations support to ensure all students can access this curricular requirement.

  • Career Development

    The School’s number one priority is to guarantee that the most capable and talented students are able to study, succeed, and acquire lifelong knowledge and skills that will prepare them for their life’s work. Personalized ongoing career counseling helps Stamps students identify opportunities, connect with alumni in the industry and get the experiences they need to build meaningful careers. The Opportunity Fund provides awards and grants to students to give them further their preparation and internship stipends to help them translate their creativity into meaningful and rewarding careers.

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Initiatives

The Stamps Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Fund provides funding to students enrolled in any Stamps program to support them in professional and personal development related to diversity, equity, and inclusion. It also provides funding to the School’s programmatic efforts and activities aimed at developing an environment that strengthens the School’s commitment to DEI and adopts tangible, sustainable practices that are guided by our organizational mission and values. 

Creative Research and Faculty Support

As with university-based research in other fields, creative research needs funding and support. This support has an impact that extends far beyond our art and design communities as our faculty are increasingly working with scientists, doctors, information architects, climatologists and others to introduce new knowledge and solve impossible problems.

Gifts to the Opportunity Fund support Stamps faculty who are able to educate the next generation of culture-makers because they are experts in their field, making a positive impact everyday and bringing it back to the classroom. The connections faculty members make, the global networks they build serve to bring Stamps students into the leading cultural conversations of our time.

Facilities and Technology Support

At Stamps, foundational skills in art and design remain essential and at the core of our curriculum. We recognize that our students also need access to the latest technologies; studios and classrooms that encourage the intermingling of media and disciplines to transform art and design education here and around the world. Gifts to the Opportunity Fund support the need for cutting-edge creative tools and technologies and state-of-the-art facilities and resources to support new ways of learning and making.

Public Program Support

Through flagship programs like the Penny Stamps Speaker Series and Stamps Gallery, the Stamps School of Art & Design augments the classroom curriculum and provides direct access to some of the most influential creative minds of the 21st century. Open to the public, these spaces provide spaces where the entire community comes together to learn, to experience, and to expand our perspectives. Click here to view Public Programs giving options.