About us -

The Mission of the Friends of South High Foundation: provide financial assistance and support for programs at South High School that directly enhance the students' overall high school experience by enriching their academic, cultural and extracurricular experience; and to support and enhance their ability to further their education.

The Foundation's History

Officially known as the Friends of South High Foundation, we exist to support current and former students of Minneapolis South High School.

The Foundation was created in 1983 by

then-Principal and alumnus George Dahl ('42),

Assistant Principal Jerry Cady,

and alumnus Dick Westby ('52)

to provide support for staff and students at Minneapolis South High School. Subsequently incorporated as a 501(c)(3) corporation, the Foundation has grown significantly from its beginnings as a largely alumni-based organization to a fully operational community support mechanism that is transparent and accountable to those who donate their time and money.  There are 13,000 alumni, parents and staff registered with the Foundation today.  Of these, over 500 are donors.

The Foundation works closely with the staff of South High School to accomplish its dual mission of supporting current students (through grants) and recent grads (through its many scholarships). Requests for grants typically originate from staff members and must be approved by the Principal. Grants must also, however, be approved by the Foundation's Board of Directors.

Students apply for the Foundation-managed scholarships through the counselors.  The actual selections of awardees is made by the Foundation's Scholarship Committee using a rigorous process.

For information about that Board of Directors, please click here.

To keep those people who have registered with the Foundation up-to-date, the Board publishes several communications each year. For more information about those publications, please click here.

Briefly, the routine publications include

• an Annual Report
• two semi-annual Newsletters
• the Tiger Blast.

In addition, the Board distributes an agenda before its meetings and minutes after its meetings.

And of course the Board maintains several legally-required documents as well.