Make An Impact Announces First Annual Impact Awards Show and Honorees
Penn State is the world’s leading service-oriented University with a long history of educating students to be citizens of the world. To recognize Penn State Alumni Athletes and their role in that tradition of service to society, the Make an Impact Fund of the Centre Foundation established the Impact Awards, which include financial grants to support the charities of the honorees.
In 2023 a five-member committee selected three Penn State football alumni who have made education-based contributions to society. The three Impact Award honorees will be recognized at the Impact Award Show at The Penn Stater Hotel on Thursday April 13th as part of Blue-White Weekend. Four current Penn State student-athletes will also be recognized for service. Beginning next year, the committee will solicit nominations to recognize alumni from all women’s and men’s teams at Penn State.
The Impact Awards will be hosted by NBC Sports Analyst Todd Blackledge. Todd was an Academic All-American and National Championship quarterback at Penn State and was also named a Distinguished Alum, Penn State’s highest honor. The show will be produced for television to be shown on stations in Pennsylvania and streamed on platforms. Details on stations, times and streaming availability will be announced soon.
Tickets for the event are available at www.PennStatersMakeAnImpact.com.
This year’s recipients are:
Bill Spoor: Bill graduated from Penn State in 1992 with a BS in Finance, a minor in Environmental Resource Management, and as a letterman in football. In 2008 Bill formed Happy Valley Uganda, Inc. which was established in 2011 as a high-impact educational initiative that gives the children of southwestern Uganda a pathway out of poverty. The founding objective is to provide children with a challenging secondary school education, real-world life skills and strong character. From 1995 to 2007, Bill worked at Merrill Lynch as a Managing Director with the Global Markets and Investment Banking Group and from 2007 to 2018 at Goldman Sachs in New York, NY as a Managing Director in the Leveraged Finance Group. Since leaving Goldman, Bill has formed Underground Farms which focuses on harnessing data to promote the responsible practices of local farmers. Bill is also a pilot, a skill that grants him access to the rural outposts of Africa.
Michael Robinson: In 2010 Michael Robinson founded Excel to Excellence as a public charity in his hometown of Richmond, Virginia to impact children that were getting left behind in society. The first of many Excel to Excellence academic programs is its current signature program, using a fun and exciting “reverse fantasy football” model to motivate students to succeed in the classroom and life. At Penn State he quarterbacked the team to a Big Ten title and an Orange Bowl Championship title in 2005. He finished 5th in the Heisman voting that year, was named the Big Ten MVP and the National College Player of The Year by Sports Illustrated On Campus Magazine. He played 8 seasons with the 49ers and Seahawks. In his career he was named to the 2012 Pro Bowl and won Super Bowl XLVIII with the Seattle Seahawks in 2014. Michael is currently a lead analyst for NFL Media and NFL Network.
Aaron Maybin: In 2009, Aaron established Project Mayhem in his hometown of Baltimore, Maryland to help underprivileged and at-risk youth excel beyond their current conditions. Through Project Mayhem and as a teacher, Aaron has implemented art workshops and curricula into many Schools in Baltimore City facing budget cuts. Aaron teaches creative arts and literacy in Baltimore public schools, created his Art Activism Curriculum (being taught in several Baltimore City Schools), and co-founded Operation Heat, raising money for schools struggling with heating issues in the wintertime. After an All-American career at Penn State University, Aaron played 5 seasons for the Bills, Jets and the Bengals before pursuing a career as a professional artist, activist, author, educator and community organizer.
For More Information visit www.PennStatersMakeAnImpact.com or e-mail Carolyn Donaldson at ZestDonaldson@gmail.com or 814-931-7778