The Power of One Day, Hamline’s fundraising event held on Nov. 11, or Veteran’s Day, caused controversy in Hamline’s veteran community. Don Allen (‘15), alumnus and President Emeritus of Hamline’s Veteran’s Organization, voiced his concerns. According to Allen, there was no veteran’s organization when he attended Hamline University in 2012. He began the organization and became passionate about “try[ing] to change policy and culture” surrounding Hamline’s veteran community.

“It says nothing there about Veterans at all, [it was] just going to be launched on Veteran’s Day,” Allen said. He was disturbed that the event would draw attention away from the significance of Veteran’s Day.

However, others saw good reasons for putting The Power of One Day on Veterans Day. “We saw that doing this on Veteran’s Day offered the opportunity to lift up fundraising for Veteran’s scholarships,” said Tony Grundhauser, Vice President of Development and Alumni Relations.

The Power of One day invited the entire Hamline community to make gifts to scholarship funds and other departments, including “a new major gift to endow scholarships for veterans in our graduate programs… our second ever endowed scholarship for veterans,” Grundhauser said.

In response to the fundraiser’s organizers, Allen asked, “Where’s the money? How do we know how much is in scholarship funds? How come we can’t get creative like other universities?”

The Power of One day committee emphasized that one person, with their contribution, could have a significant impact on Hamline and the world. “We feel it is important to act on behalf of our veterans on this day and hope to exceed our goals.” Grundhauser said.

The results released by Katy McFall, Director of Annual Giving Programs, revealed that the Power of One day did exceed last year’s amount collected. The fundraiser “was a tremendous success, with gifts from 550 donors totaling $170,000,” McFall wrote. The program also announced the “$50,000 endowment gift from the Disabled American Veterans of Minnesota Foundation to help reinforce the university’s efforts in supporting veterans and active service members,” she said.

In terms of the idea of doing Power of One Day on Veterans Day, Grundhauser said it “provided additional incentive for our department to raise funds in support of our veteran students.” Allen said “‘veteran-friendly’ is just a marketing term.”

“The reason why many of these students are walking around this campus is for what the veterans did fighting,” said Allen.

The Power of One day accomplished what it set out to do: raise funds for the Hamline community. However, groups within this community may continue to be critical as to where these funds are allocated and for what reasons.