Shady Grove Fertility to Provide Scholarships to Two People Born Through SGF Services

Shady Grove Fertility has been at the start of over 100,000 lives. Now, Shady Grove Fertility would like to continue to make a positive impact on our community by launching the Shady Grove Fertility Scholarship Fund.

The Shady Grove Fertility Scholarship Fund is designed for children born through services at SGF. In 2022, SGF will provide two $5,000 grants.

“The ideal student will exemplify SGF’s values including excellence, integrity, compassion, and commitment.”

The Shady Grove Fertility Scholarship Fund supports children conceived through assisted reproductive technology at SGF. Eligible student awardees will receive a one-time grant to use toward undergraduate or graduate school tuition.

In 2019, SGF announced the recipients of its first-ever SGF Scholarship fund. Hannah Ward, a Towson University student, and Alexandra Dillingham, a Virginia Tech student, have been selected to receive scholarships of $5,000 each.

Both Ms. Ward and Ms. Dillingham’s applications were selected by an SGF Scholarship Committee based not only on their outstanding academic performance but also for exhibiting strong moral character that exemplifies SGF’s core values of compassion, excellence, and integrity.

“Shady Grove Fertility was founded on a patient-centric model, which at its core was articulated simply by our co-founders, Drs. Michael J. Levy and Arthur Sagoskin: always do what is best for the patient. Now, nearly 30 years and 85,000 babies later, we are proud to once again do something to benefit our patient community,” shared Mark Segal, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of SGF.

Twenty years ago, the Ward and Dillingham families were having parallel lives, each with one child and the desire to have more. After trying on their own for many years, the Ward family turned to SGF’s Art Sagoskin, M.D., and the Dillinghams sought help from Michael Edelstein, M.D. Both couples struggled with the reality of secondary infertility as well as the stigma of not being able to conceive without help.

“Treatment was hard emotionally because no one talked about infertility during the 90s. You’d see the words ‘test tube babies’ splashed across the news, so I was hesitant to tell our friends and family we were going through IVF. I didn’t know anyone at the time that had infertility, but I stayed strong because I knew I wanted more children,” says Mary Ward, Hannah’s mother and former SGF patient.

Today, the one in eight couples who experience infertility are breaking through that stigma and have access to larger support networks such as SGF’s support groups and social community, which is 40,000+ members strong.

“As a fertility patient you never forget the time spent, the connections you made, the bonds you shared with your physician and their entire team during your fertility journey. Your experience is permanently in your heart and forever stored in your memory. You are reminded often when you look at your child. As a large practice such as SGF seeing thousands of patients a year, one can understand how patients move on and memories of them fade; however, I applaud SGF for not wanting to forget. Their idea for a scholarship showcasing former patients and their children is special and unique,” shared Lynn Dillingham, Alexandra’s mother and former SGF patient.

The 2022 Scholarship application window is open through Friday, February 11, 2022 at 12:00 p.m. ET.

You can apply here.

Featured photo courtesy of Shady Grove Fertility