The Burr Oak Endowment Fund of Downingtown Friends Meeting, approved at the March 2007 Meeting for Business, will provide income for groups of young Friends to travel nationally and internationally for workshops, work camps, and peace conferences, or for scholarships for students attending Quaker schools. Our meeting will decide together how the income from these funds is to be used, unless specified by the donor.

Those members and attenders who contribute to the Burr Oak Endowment will be honored at an annual dinner in the fall.

Anyone can add to the fund by giving outright gifts directly to the Fund. Funds will be invested with the Friends Fiduciary Corporation, allowing our Meeting to have access to a small percentage of the Fund for spending each year.

You also have the option of making Meeting a part of your estate plan. At the time of death, the principal will pass to our Meeting. The most common planned gift is a bequest, simply made through a will. Donors often designate specific purposes for bequests to Meeting. If a bequest is undesignated, at least half of it will go to the Burr Oak Endowment Fund. However, Meeting can direct all of an undesignated bequest to the endowment if it so wishes.

An attractive planned way of giving to Meeting is through a charitable gift annuity, which provides a fixed lifetime income payment to whoever the donor designates. In addition, the donor will receive federal income tax benefits at the time of the gift. Annuity rates are tied directly to the age of the income beneficiary at the time the gift is made. The older the annuitant is at the time of the gift, the higher the rate. The minimum gift to establish an annuity is $5,000. The minimum age for the annuitant/income beneficiary is 50. 

The 3rd annual appreciation dinner of the Burr Oak Society of our Friends Meeting occurred October 24, 2009 with all of 12 members present. The dinner is the way Meeting shows its appreciation to those making a commitment to Meeting's Endowment Fund. Contributions can be by cash or by naming our Meeting as a beneficiary in a will, IRA, insurance policy, or with a charitable gift annuity. To talk about even more ways of helping to ensure the long term effectiveness of our programs, talk with any member of the Endowment Fund Committee.