Natalie Jacobson McCracken, Scholarship Committee

Women's Guild Scholarships

The Boston University Women’s Guild scholarships were established more than twenty-five years ago to provide both aid and encouragement to women thirty and over enrolled in University graduate programs. Guild scholarships, unlike many others, do not require U.S. citizenship or (recognizing that women often have other responsibilities) full-time enrollment. Awards consist of the endowed Katherine Connor McLaughlin Memorial scholarship and others funded by donations from Guild members. The total awarded yearly averages about $5,500.

Winners have ranged in age from 30 to 58 and have come from all BU schools offering graduate programs and from many countries, including, in recent years, Japan, Russia, Israel, the Republic of Croatia, China, Nigeria, Iran, Peru, Germany and Greece. Their average graduate grade point average is 3.8. Extraordinary expenses that awards have helped pay include child care, support of parents and parents-in-law, and treatment of serious chronic conditions as well as tuition, production costs for thesis films, and travel and other research needs.

The Guild pays printing, postage, and other charges so that all donated money is awarded. A donor may specify that an award be named in that year for an honoree. Please send donations to:

Boston University Women’s Guild
P.O. Box 314
Boston University Station
Boston, Massachusetts 02215

The 2008 Women's Guild scholarship application is now available for download*. Please address any inquiries to nmccrack@bu.edu.

The Florence Engel Randall Fiction Awards

The annual Florence Engel Randall Fiction Awards are administered by the Women’s Guild, thanks to an endowed fund established by the late Ruth Levine, a longtime Guild member; Stewart Randall, Mrs. Randall’s son; and others.

The undergraduate award winner is selected by a short story competition open to all undergraduate women at the University and judged by a published fiction writer in the BU community. The graduate award is given to the outstanding woman in the Creative Writing Program, as selected by program faculty.

Florence Engel Randall (1917–1997) was the author of The Almost Year, a 1971 American Library Association Notable Book, and four other successful novels as well as more than 100 short stories published in literary and popular journals. Her papers are in BU’s Twentieth Century Archives.

The 2008 Florence Engel Randall Fiction Awards application is now available for download*. Please address any inquiries to nmccrack@bu.edu.

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