Growing up in Bombay, India, Regan Gurung’s vision of America was heavily shaped by Archie comics and lists of the top liberal arts colleges. In high school he wrote to all of them, hoping to join the incoming class of 1991. Unfortunately, everyone—Carleton included—responded that there was no aid for international students.
But as chance would have it, a friend of Gurung’s family had recently returned from Northfield, Minnesota, where she celebrated her 50th reunion with the Carleton class of 1936.
“She loved Carleton in 1936, and she adored it in 1986,” Gurung says. “She said, ‘it’s spectacular—you have to go—you have to apply.’”
So Gurung applied early decision even though he knew he had no way to afford it. His friend was determined to help him and called on her friends from the class of 1936 to help. On Christmas morning, Gurung received a telegram from Carleton saying he was accepted on a full scholarship.
“I consider that my alumni loan,” Gurung says. “It wasn’t a student loan—it was an alumni loan because I will be paying it forward now as long as I can.”
He began paying it forward the year he graduated with a gift to the Alumni Annual Fund, and he’s continued to support the Annual Fund every year since then. In 2014 he and his wife, Martha Ahrendt Gurung ’91, joined the Joseph Lee Heywood Society by documenting a will provision for unrestricted support of the college.
“We both love Carleton,” Gurung says. “It was absolutely a no-brainer to join the Heywood Society because Martha and I both feel strongly that it’s important to think about these things now rather than when we’re 75 or 80.”