Gifts to Moore
Matching Funds Expands Dean's Circle
A decision to give the Moore School up to $50,000 in matching funds to
attract new members to the Dean’s Circle was an easy one for Douglas (Doug) K.
Freeman (MBA ’76). “I generally have been honored to do whatever the school has
asked me to do. I believe an executive who has been successful in large part
because of an education should give back to help other people have the
experience,” he says.
The Dean’s Circle is composed of individuals who have contributed $1,000 or more to the Moore School. Gifts to the Dean’s Circle are important, says Development Director Bob Gayle, because they are unrestricted, which allows the school to apply the funds to the areas of greatest need. Gayle says this is the first matching gift of its kind for the Moore School. “We are fortunate to have someone like him step up to the plate.”
Freeman says those who give to the Dean’s Circle are “today’s and tomorrow’s leaders,” and he is glad to lend a helping hand to increase membership. “It’s a wonderful deal for the school… If you try to equate the annual gift to the Dean’s Circle with an endowment, it’s a big number, so we’re making a difference in what we do here.”
A Dean’s Circle supporter since 2000, Freeman has also served on the USC-Business Partnership Foundation since 2002, and was an adjunct faculty member in the late 1980s.
Freeman has 30 years’ experience in the financial services industry, including senior-level positions with Bank of America, Barnett Bank, and Wells Fargo Bank. While some executives would see their careers winding down at this point, Freeman is on the leading edge of a revolution in banking. As Chief Executive Officer of NetBank, the country’s first and most commercially successful online bank, Freeman oversees $5 billion in assets and travels constantly to offices around the country, including one in Columbia with 750 employees. NetBank is headquartered in Atlanta.
The time is right for online banking, Freeman says. “Survey after survey shows that 35-40 percent of Americans never go into a bank branch. Today, they do everything electronically, through the mail, or at an ATM. We believe those people are very ripe to go to an Internet-only bank.”
Though Freeman has lived and worked all
over the United States, the Charleston native has never forgotten his roots. His
education in South Carolina enabled him to compete in a national arena, he says.
“I have an undergraduate degree from Furman University, which I think is an
outstanding liberal arts school. Couple that with the skills set that I received
with my MBA at Carolina, and that has served me well over my career. If I had to
do it all over again, I would do exactly what I did.”
What would Freeman say
to others considering a significant gift to the Moore School? “I would say the
momentum from Darla Moore’s gifts, the leadership provided by Dean [Joel] Smith,
the wonderful array of people who are both graduates and nongraduates of the
business school who are supporters of what the school is trying to do… will make
a tremendous difference for the state of South Carolina and the whole Southeast,
for that matter, if we can continue the evolution of this business
school.
“In my opinion, business is the key to everything. The better business leaders we have, the better jobs we’re going to create; the better jobs we create, the better family situations we will have… and the better families will be able to educate their children. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. But it all starts with education and business leadership.”