The tournaments on the PGA Tour — along with those from affiliates such as PGA Tour Champions and the Korn Ferry Tour — note that they have donated net proceeds exceeding $3.93 billion over the years, dating back to 1938, according to PGATour.com.
It’s a very impressive number, and much good has been done with the money through the many organizations which receive such funds. A prominent example — one of many — is the Waste Management Phoenix Open, which, through the Thunderbirds, shelled out $17.5 million for Arizona Charities from the 2024 tournament. Other huge givers over the course of many years include the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am ($18 million in the 2022-23 fiscal year through the Monterey Peninsula Foundation), and The Players Championship.
When Colorado used to host an annual PGA Tour event, The International was likewise generous with its giving. But, as golf fans from the Centennial State discovered first-hand a decade ago — and will find out again this summer (Aug. 22-25 at Castle Pines Golf Club) — there’s something about the BMW Championship that sets it apart when it comes to PGA Tour-related charitable giving.
Perhaps it’s the fact that not only does the BMW Championship have one lone beneficiary, but it’s one directly tied to golf.
The Western Golf Association, which hosts the BMW Championship, administers the Evans Scholarship for caddies through the Evans Scholars Foundation. All the net proceeds from the BMW Championship benefit the Evans Scholars program, with more than $50 million going from the tournament to the cause since the Western Open transformed into the BMW Championship in 2007, including $5.5 million from the 2023 event.
Given that Evans Scholarships are for full tuition and housing for the caddies who earn them, it’s estimated that the scholarship is worth an average of more than $125,000 if renewed for four years. Over the years, more than 12,000 caddies have graduated from the E.S. program, with 1,130 more currently enrolled at 24 universities nationwide. This coming school year, a record 340 caddies will begin their journey as new Evans Scholars. It all started with Chick Evans — an amateur who won a U.S. Open and two U.S. Amateurs — starting the caddie scholarship in 1930 with the help of the WGA.
And there’s a substantial Colorado connection to the Evans Scholarship as one of those E.S. schools has been located at the University of Colorado since the 1960s. There are now 540 CU Evans Scholar alums, with about 55 caddies currently in the house in Boulder.
All those numbers and facts are impressive, but what really makes the program so heartfelt for many supporters is the difference the scholarship makes for each individual who graduates from the program. For the record, teenagers are awarded the Evans Scholarship based on outstanding caddie and academic records, strong character and demonstrated substantial financial need.
I was one of those very fortunate ones to receive an Evans Scholarship to CU — in my case after/while being a caddie and caddiemaster at Columbine Country Club. So were my three daughters, all of whom went to CU after caddying at Boulder Country Club. Like so many others, receiving an Evans Scholarship changed our life paths immensely — albeit in ways that sometimes don’t become apparent for many years. At the very least, the scholarship helped guide us on a route that opened many doors that otherwise would have been closed.
In my own case, it led me to a fulfilling career as a sports writer and editor. And though I’ve covered many sports over the years, I’ve had the pleasure of reporting on and writing about golf in Colorado regularly since 1983. And the sport has become more and more of an emphasis over the years, to the point that I now spend most of my working time writing about golf in Colorado.
But there are hundreds of different stories like mine — just from CU Evans Scholar grads, not to mention the thousands from Scholars from elsewhere. The scholarship led to them becoming doctors, business owners, pilots, engineers, lawyers, executives, journalists — and just about everything in between.
For just a smattering of examples regarding CU Evans Scholars from the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s — around my time in the E.S. house in Boulder — many of whom have played key roles in Colorado golf in one respect or another:
And that just scratches the surface of CU Evans Scholar alums who have made a significant impact in Colorado golf. Outside of the golf realm, per se, CU E.S. alum Dan Caplis is a well-known attorney and radio talk show host based in the Denver metro area.
Earlier this summer at a BMW Championship media event at Castle Pines Golf Club, Duffy Solich was spreading the word about the lesser-known aspect of the BMW Championship.
“The BMW Championship is always a thrilling week of incredible golf,” he said. “But its lasting impact is the difference it makes in the lives of youth caddies through the funding of the Evans Scholarship … this great charity that changes the lives of so many young men and women. My brother George and I know this firsthand as this scholarship allowed us the opportunity to attend a first-class university at CU-Boulder, and we’re both devoted to this cause that forever changed the course of our lives. … The BMW Championship has played a critical role in helping us increase awareness of the Evans Scholars Foundation and send more caddies to college.”
Given that direct link to such a worthwhile golf cause, it’s little wonder why the BMW Championship has been named the PGA Tour’s Tournament of the Year five times since 2008, including last year, when it shared the honor with the Waste Management Phoenix Open. One of those instances was in 2014, when Cherry Hills Country Club hosted the BMW tournament, which drew more than 125,000 people for the week. George Solich served as the general chairman for that event a decade ago.
Meanwhile, the Evans Scholarship — and caddying in general — has long been a flagship program for the CGA, which partners with the WGA in supporting the scholarship at CU. Through the CGA’s membership fees and Par Club contributions, Colorado donors fully fund the year-to-year scholarship costs at the CU Evans Scholars house.
Nationwide, Evans Scholars average a cumulative 3.3 GPA and 98 percent of them graduate from the program.
Each year, the WGA and its partners conduct dozens of Evans Scholar Selection Committee events across the country where finalists for the scholarship are interviewed by an often-large group of people from the local golf community and stewards of the program. One of those events is held in Colorado annually — usually in mid-winter — when the incoming class of CU Evans Scholars is selected. It often proves to be an emotional, heart-wrenching and eye-opening affair.
It’s not unusual for finalists to be the first members of their families to be headed to college. A significant number of the applicants had never been on a golf course before they began their caddie training. The number of inspirational stories told in these selection meetings — and often the amount of personal adversity the finalists have overcome — is amazing. The words “life changing” are sure to come up — and in many cases, it’s no hyperbole.
So while much of the focus and attention at the BMW Championship in late August will rightly go to the golfers, the course, the competition, etc., don’t forget the story behind the story. It’s one worth remembering — and supporting.
About the Writer: Gary Baines has covered golf in Colorado continuously since 1983. He was a sports writer at the Daily Camera newspaper in Boulder, then the sports editor there, and has written regularly for ColoradoGolf.org since 2009. The University of Colorado Evans Scholar alum was inducted into the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame in 2022. He owns and operates ColoradoGolfJournal.com