When Rick Howard '68 arrived in Burlington in 1964 as a first-generation university student, he experienced a massive cultural change from small-town Vermont. He says honestly, “I was overwhelmed at first. The jump from high school to college knocks many people off the rails, and almost got me. It took me 2-3 years to sort myself out.”
Despite the shock, track coach Archie Post instilled discipline and gave Rick structure. He also possessed an innate competitive drive that pushed him forward, despite the challenges.
Before stepping on campus though, it was the Wilbur Fund that made it possible for him to enroll at the University of Vermont. That scholarship did more than help him cover tuition. It changed the course of his life, and the lives that followed.
“Without the Wilbur Fund I would have been unable to attend UVM, and probably no college at all,” Rick said recently by email. “As it was, my UVM education started me on the road that led to a PhD in chemistry, and massively changed my life.”
First in the Family
Rick grew up in Vermont and was the first in his family to go to college. Finances were tight.
He had offers from other schools, but UVM was the only path that made sense financially. It was the Wilbur Fund scholarship that bridged the gap for him.
While navigating a new and somewhat bewildering environment on campus, he ran track and cross-country, picked up work-study jobs, and found mentors in classrooms where chemistry and math came alive.
Then, as he was finishing his undergraduate degree, he had his sights on graduate school. That decision, he says, came straight from the confidence and momentum that UVM made possible. After UVM, Rick earned a doctorate in chemistry and built a career shaped by the habits he formed on the track and in the lab.
He also built a family culture that expects learning to continue. “I was the first in my family to attend college, and it broke a cycle,” he says. “The children of college graduates generally seek higher education, and their children, too. That first step is the hardest, and rewards generations to come.”
His two children earned advanced degrees, and his grandchildren will join the college ranks in a few years. The ripple started with a scholarship.
The Wilbur Legacy, Alive Today
Rick appreciates the lineage behind his own opportunity to come to UVM.
The Wilbur Fund began with a $1.5M bequest from James B. Wilbur in 1929. A massive sum of money at the time, it has grown to a $27M endowment today and provides more than $1M in scholarship support to students each year. That means thousands of graduates have been given the opportunity to succeed because of a small act of kindness from nearly 100 years ago.
Rick knows Wilbur’s greatest legacy is the quiet, steady support for students who need it. Students who need an opportunity to do great things.
Paying it forward for student-athletes
That insight informs Rick’s philanthropy today. He created the W.F. (Rick) Howard Scholarship to support students from Vermont who participate on the Track and Field & Cross-Country program.
He remembers the lift he felt as a student-athlete who needed help to stay enrolled and stay focused. “I wanted to give athletes the nudge that keeps them moving forward,” he says. The scholarship signals to students that their Catamount community believes in them.
“Persevere,” Rick says, thinking about today’s students who receive scholarship support. “If you have a goal, keep going. Sometimes it is a slog. Keep going.”
The advice is simple, yet powerful. It reflects how Rick sees the power of access. Scholarships open the door, then hard work moves a student forward.
What scholarships make possible
He has visited Burlington only a few times in recent decades, but he stays connected through university updates and the memories that surface with every mention of Old Mill and the Green. He remembers professors who took extra time. He remembers the rhythm of training runs in all weather. He remembers the moment he realized graduate school was within reach.
Most of all, he remembers what it felt like to know that someone he would never meet had invested in him.
The story he wants to share with fellow alumni is not about accolades or titles. It is about access, opportunity, and persistence. It is about the way an act of generosity can change a family’s expectations. It is about alumni who look back, feel gratitude, and decide to create that same opening for someone else.
Rick says it plainly. “That is why I support scholarships,” he wrote. “The first step is the hardest, and rewards generations to come.”
Read About More Alumni Lives
UVM Alumni are living rich lives, doing astounding and impactful work in many fields, in communities around Vermont, across the US, and around the world. Here are just a few of the stories we've gotten to share recently:
Rick Howard '68: Sixty years later, a scholarship still shapes a life
Kevin Morgenstein Fuerst
Nov 25, 2025