How The Program Works

Since 1962, thousands of young people from 175 nations have been selected by committees in their home countries to complete the last two years of high school at one of twelve United World College schools. UWC schools are in the United States, Canada, Bosnia, Costa Rica, Hong Kong, India, Italy, Norway, Singapore, Swaziland, the United Kingdom, and Venezuela. The UWC movement works to build multinational, cross-cultural communication and understanding among all its students.

In 2000, the Davis United World College Scholars Program began providing scholarship grants to a pilot group of American colleges and universities to support United World College graduates who matriculated at these schools. This year these pilot schools — Colby College, College of the Atlantic, Middlebury College, Princeton University, and Wellesley College — are graduating their fifth class of Davis United World College Scholars. Based on the success of building clusters of globally minded scholars at these piloat schools, Davis philanthropy chose to greatly expand both the number of campuses and scholars in the program.

Since 2004 an additional 83 American colleges and universities have been accepted as partner schools in the Davis United World College Scholars Program. To these schools, the program contributes $10,000 each year for each matriculated UWC graduate, for up to four years per student. These scholarships have increased up to $20,000 for “cluster schools” (see story on page 17). The total number of Davis UWC Scholars at all participating colleges and universities has now reached 1,424, from 131 countries. The 2008 graduating class includes 264 exceptional students from 131 nations.

With their education made possible through their own merits and the help of the Davis United World College Scholars Program, thousands of future graduates of these institutions will go on to play important, meaningful, often leadership roles in their communities, in their home countries, and in the world.