Why I Give
I arrived on the Mountain in 1970. From day one, everything about Aiglon was a revelation—the extraordinary people, fondue bourguignonne, the breathtaking scenery, Tony Hyde's take-no-prisoners math classes, the skiing, the expeditions, the loud clanging of cowbells during spring and autumn transhumances, you name it. It was also a place where I made friends for life, learned to speak French, and gained a new perspicacity and self-confidence that gave my life an unexpected new trajectory.
After university, I went on to found several companies that took me routinely to Italy, Spain, France, England, Germany, and elsewhere. I was the subject of numerous articles, including two in The New York Times and another in Entrepreneur magazine. In short, I had a career that would have been highly improbable had it not been for my Aiglon experience. But my own life story is inconsequential compared to the life-changing opportunities Aiglon is now providing for teenagers from economically challenged backgrounds. Today, while continuing to help impressive students who require some financial assistance, the school provides full tuition and thus remarkable international career paths for talented young men and women from developing countries who otherwise might spend a lifetime struggling to find a way out of the shadows cast by their circumstances. The various scholarship initiatives alone should make Aiglonians proud to support their Alma Mater.
They say that gratitude is love projected into the past, charity is love projected into the present, and hope is love projected into the future. I will always be enormously grateful for my time on the Mountain. Giving back is one way of expressing that gratitude. But it's also a way of supporting Aiglon's current priorities and expressing my hope that there will always be a special school in that special place where I—and so many of my classmates—found a new extended family and discovered so many amazing possibilities.
Wesley Green ('72)
