It's been almost two weeks since Baldwin County's annual "Education of Evening Champions" fundraising event, where school board members, faculty and community members gathered for food, drinks and a live auction to benefit the Baldwin Bred Future Teacher Program and Josh Hall memorial scholarship.

The future teacher program recognizes Baldwin County graduates and current high school seniors who are pursuing a degree in education, while the memorial scholarship recognizes employees and children of county employees who also strive to become teachers or obtain a degree in education.

Tiffany Wilson, human resources director for the district, said that while this is only the event's second year, almost $60,000 was raised from the auction and sponsorships.

"We are just a few dollars shy of $60,000, and after the expenses of the event that profit will be a little under $50,000," Wilson said. "I think the word is getting out and our business sponsors understand what we're doing and the impact it has had, and the people it impacts."

Wilson said that while the event started last year, the program began almost four years ago out of the HR department's desire to support high school seniors who wanted to become educators.

The school board quickly partnered with the Baldwin County Education Coalition, a local nonprofit, to make these desires a reality.

"We received donations for two years, when the donations committee began talking about ideas of how to involve business donors who wanted to collaborate on a higher level than just giving donations," Wilson said. "So far, we have given 27 scholarships out and 12 scholarships to current employees."

Wilson said that she hopes to see the program continue to grow over the next few years and sustain even more scholarships.

"When we first started, our goal was to get to a point where we could do one scholarship per feeder pattern, and we have far exceeded that goal already," Wilson said. "This year, our goal is to continue to sustain scholarships, and to tell these stories in a meaningful way so our business sponsors can see the impact this program has."

Wilson said she has seen the program's benefits first hand, as the first group of scholarship recipients are expected to graduate college and return to work in Baldwin County next fall.

"The first year of the program we awarded four scholarships, and we expect three students to come back," Wilson said. "They will still have to go through the same interview process, but we anticipate that they will be at our teacher fair in the spring and have offers as early as April."