Tree Research and Education Endowment Fund (TREE Fund) is proud to announce its Spring 2025 grant and scholarship recipients.

After approval during the TREE Fund Board of Trustees meeting, one research grant and three education grants, including two from the new Davey Tree Expert Company Community Arboriculture Education Grant Program, are being awarded. In addition to these grants, 10 students were awarded TREE Fund scholarships toward their continuing education in the amount of $5,000 each.

With these new grants and scholarships being awarded, TREE Fund has surpassed $6 million in giving in accordance with its mission to identify and support programs that discover and disseminate new knowledge in the fields of arboriculture and urban forestry.

Celebrating its 15^th year, a $50,000 grant from the Utility Arborist Research Fund Grant Program was awarded to Melody Mount of the University of Tennessee for the project “Impacts of Accessor Perceptions, Species, and Defects When Performing Tree Risk Assessments.”

Three education grants were awarded this spring with two grants coming from the new Davey Tree Expert Company Community Arboriculture Education Grant Program. One grant of $4,985 was awarded to the Cornell Cooperative Extension of Monroe County (New York) for its “Urban Tree Equity Education and Outreach” program. A second grant of $5,000 goes to St. Olaf College (Minnesota) for its “Educating St. Olaf and Carleton College Students on Disease/ Pest Identification, Safe Chainsaw Use, and Tree Care as a Profession” program.

The Ohio Chapter ISA Education Grant in the amount of $5,000 was awarded to Western Reserve Land Conservancy in Ohio for its Tree Steward Training Program.

A total of 10 student scholarships were awarded this cycle. Five of which came from the Robert Felix Memorial Scholarship Program. Scholarship recipients include Clayton Mahoney of Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College (Georgia), Jackson Wilson of Michigan Tech University, Tyler Stewart of Brigham Young University (Utah), Patience Tongo Fouelefack of College La Cite (Ottawa) and Connor Will of Virginia Tech University.

The Tree Care Industry Association raised funds for the scholarship program through the Robert Felix Memorial fishing tournament. Sponsored by Vermeer and the ISA, the tournament was held at TCIA’s Winter Management Conference in St. Thomas in February 2025. The 2026 fundraiser will also be a fishing tournament, again to be held at the Winter Management Conference 2026, this time in Costa Rica.

Also receiving scholarships this cycle were Keely Zuber of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, who received the Bonnie Appleton Memorial Scholarship; Olivia Shetterly of the College of DuPage (Illinois), who received the Larry R. Hall Memorial Scholarship; Owen McKinley of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, who received the Will Nutter Memorial Scholarship; Trinity Willoughby of Pennsylvania College of Technology, who received the Fran Ward Women in Arboriculture Scholarship; and Alex Prideaux of the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, who received the John Wright Memorial Scholarship.

TREE Fund is a non-profit organization whose mission is to support scientific discovery and dissemination of new knowledge in the fields of arboriculture and urban forestry. TREE Fund promotes scientific inquiry designed to benefit commercial, residential, utility and consulting arborists, urban foresters and other professionals in related fields in their shared work to create, support and sustain vibrant urban canopies. More information can be found at www.treefund.org.