In reviewing recent accomplishments for the Derek Hughes/NAPSLO Educational Foundation, I looked back through past annual messages to contributors and noted that most of those reports featured several individual highlights of the year that I thought were significant. I am proud of the Foundation’s achievements over the years and thank all those that made those possible.

But 2002 was different and reviewing the past year I feel we had over one million significant reasons to be jubilant.

Scholarships
To enumerate those million reasons, I want to start with our scholarship program. Twelve students are attending university classes during the 2002-03 school year with the help of our various scholarship funds.

In addition to the existing scholarship funds, the Rollie Wiegers’ Fund and the Kevin McLaughlin Fund, in February 2002 the Foundation created the 9/11 Scholarship Fund to assist students who had a parental loss in the World Trade Center attack of September 11, 2001.

The 9/11 Scholarship Fund was endowed by the proceeds from the Foundation Golf Invitational event that took place in February 2002 in San Antonio at the special spring NAPSLO meeting. With the proceeds from the golf event we were able to assist a student whose father died in the tragedy.

The 9/11 Scholarship was not the only new scholarship funded as we witnessed the establishment of two additional scholarship funds. The Herbert Kauffman Scholarship Fund and the Scott Polley Scholarship Fund were established with contributions recognizing the impact each person had on the industry. I am pleased to note that both funds have over $100,000 today with additional funds coming in from various sources.

These additional funds will allow us to continue awarding scholarships to outstanding academic and financially deserving students despite the current decline in investment yields. In addition, the increased funding will give us the resources to consider increasing the scholarship amount for the fall term in 2003 to help offset the continued increases in higher education costs.

A.M. Best report
The increased scholarship opportunities are only part of the million reasons the Foundation has to be thankful. How about supplying over 3,000 copies of the latest edition of the A.M. Best Review of the Excess and Surplus Lines Insurance Industry to regulators, the media and the insurance industry in general?

Through a Foundation grant provided to the A.M. Best Company, we helped spread the word again last fall about the financial integrity and valuable function of the surplus lines insurance market and its distribution system.

The publication, besides being available to Foundation contributors, is distributed to all insurance commissioners, several insurance trade organizations, NAPSLO members and is made a part of the Associate in Surplus Lines Insurance (ASLI) designation program.

This was the ninth edition of this review and it continues to be used by many people when they speak on the business of insurance and that portion of the business that comprises the excess and surplus lines industry.

ASLI designation
The Annual Review was released at the 2002 NAPSLO Convention, where 36 new ASLI designees were recognized for attaining the designation. That group brought the total number achieving the ASLI to nearly 500 in only six years. These people are recognized for the academic pursuit of the designation but more importantly they are the professionals today that set the standards for tomorrow.

To promote the designation, we put together a successful media campaign with the assistance of the Insurance Journal, the Insurance Journal of Texas, The National Underwriter and Rough Notes magazines. The Foundation also distributed copies of the ASLI textbooks to all the students attending both NAPSLO E&S Schools.

Symposium
More reasons to celebrate came from seeing 85 college students from around the country attend the first Derek Hughes/NAPSLO Educational Foundation and Troy State University Insurance Symposium. The Foundation provided a grant to assist Dr. Carol Jordan in conducting this symposium that keyed on the excess and surplus lines insurance industry. Business leaders from the surplus lines industry as well as the risk manager from a major corporation gave the students a glimpse of how the surplus lines industry helps to round out the insurance programs for businesses large and small.

Fundraising
All of these efforts require adequate funding. Ensuring that we had the necessary resources were two members of our Board who took the lead on Campaign 21. The campaign’s goal was to raise an additional $1 million before the end of 2002. This would put our funding over $3 million and allow us to work within the investment income generated to support the various programs currently underway. I am pleased to report that not only did they raise more than a million dollars, they did it before the end of 2002! Hearty thanks go out to Marcus Payne and Max Williamson for their diligent efforts!

Overall, the 12 directors on the Foundation Board made all these successes happen this past year. Add all these successes together and you have well over 1 million reasons to be very jubilant about an excellent year for the Foundation.

I personally want to say thank you to a dedicated Board of Directors. These people make my job a lot easier. But you, the contributors, are also to be thanked. Without your generous support we could not bring forth the truth about the excess and surplus lines industry. We could not help the deserving students as they pursue an education that will eventually help fill the positions that are opening daily in the surplus lines arena.

The next year presents many challenges, but we are set to deal with them. Your continued support will enable us to achieve our mission of educating everyone concerned about the financially stable and valuable contribution that the excess and surplus lines insurance industry provides to the insuring public.

Respectfully submitted,

Joseph D. Timmons, CPCU, ASLI
President