Monday to Friday, Bill Carswell (’75) wears the maroon and white regalia of his employer, the College of Charleston. Once he clocks out and is free for the weekend, he swaps those team colors for garnet and black, proud to show off his alma mater.
“USC is where my future began,” he says. “Carolina means a lot to me. I promote it as much as I can for people who don’t know the university like I did.”
Carswell has worked at the College of Charleston since 1980, using his B.S. in Management from USC’s Darla Moore School of Business to serve as director of guest housing/management of the Faculty Club in the President’s Office. In this position, he has been able to watch the real-time changes higher education has experienced over the decades, most notably in affordability and access. Recalling his own past financial struggles as a student at USC inspired him to give back in support of the next generation of students.
“The costs can be higher for the typical student,” he says. “It takes a lot to do anything anymore. The giving back part is great, the fact that I am contributing to the welfare of a future student, especially the student stories about how they wouldn’t have made it without those scholarships.”
His first act of philanthropy was buying a personalized brick on the Horseshoe. He still enjoys finding it along the path as he walks around campus on one of his regular visits — also making time to stop by the School of Business, eat a meal at the Top of Carolina in Capstone, and enjoy his season football tickets and a baseball game, especially when the Gamecocks play College of Charleston. These visits reconnect him with old friends and classmates, who, as the memories flood back, ponder how the university is “different, and yet it’s still the same.”
“That’s the uniqueness of Carolina. We’re all the same, we’re equal, and we want to accomplish the best for USC,” Carswell says. “We want to stand out, to shine, to be the best, and it’s good to know that I am a contributing factor.”
Besides buying a brick, Carswell has participated in several additional forms of philanthropy: a donation to the Judy Riser Nursing Endowed Scholarship Fund in the College of Nursing, and the naming of the box office at Founders Park, as well as his membership in the Athletics’ department’s Garnet Society. The nursing scholarship honors his close friend Judy Riser, with whom he worked at the College of Charleston and who had contracted Polio at a young age.
What appealed to Carswell about his gifts to the Judy Riser Fund and Founders Park was their immediate impact on current students.
“If I see where I can help, I try to help,” he says. “I’m just thankful that as a former student I can give back to this great university that helped me to get ready for my future.”