A commitment to community: How Morehead-Cain Alumni continue to invest in one another

From mentorship and shared experiences to record-setting participation in giving, Morehead-Cain Alumni are sustaining a community where leadership, connection, and generosity extend across generations.

This story is part of the 2026 Morehead-Cain Day of Giving series, celebrating a decade of collective generosity and the formative experiences, opportunities, and connections our alumni community has helped make possible.

Spence Whitman ’26 and Kevin Massey ’01 at the Mentoring Program Breakfast during the 2025 Alumni Forum (photo by Leon Godwin)

The Morehead-Cain experience doesn’t end at graduation. For generations of scholars and alumni, it has been the beginning of a lifelong connection to a community committed to learning, growing, and making a meaningful difference in the lives of others.

Today, the community includes approximately 3,500 alumni across industries, geographies, and generations. They are educators, entrepreneurs, researchers, public servants, and leaders in their communities. Their experiences and pursuits are diverse, but they share a commitment to supporting one another and investing in those who come after them.

That commitment takes many forms: the time spent mentoring a scholar, a conversation that opens a new possibility, a weekend spent reconnecting with classmates, or a financial gift that creates opportunities for future generations.

Each reflects a defining part of the Morehead-Cain experience: leadership is a lifelong journey, strengthened through relationships and a commitment to others.

Mentorship that comes full circle

For Morehead-Cain Scholars navigating their undergraduate journeys and considering what comes next, the experience and perspective of alumni can be invaluable.

Through the Morehead-Cain Mentoring Program, junior and senior scholars connect with alumni who offer guidance, share their experiences, and help scholars approach important decisions with greater confidence.

The program is designed to strengthen the skills that contribute to purposeful leadership, including decision-making, communication, and navigating unfamiliar challenges. Over the past three years, it has facilitated 318 mentor-mentee pairings, connecting scholars with alumni whose paths offer new perspectives on the possibilities ahead.

But the value of these relationships often extends beyond a single year.

The story of Amit Gupta ’08 and Kartik Tyagi ’23 offers a meaningful example of the intergenerational connections that define Morehead-Cain. Their mentorship connection illustrates how relationships between scholars and alumni create opportunities for learning, reflection, and connection.

For Kartik, that commitment to community has continued beyond graduation.

In August 2026, he returned to Carolina to share his Morehead-Cain journey and undergraduate experiences with incoming scholars and global fellows during New Scholar Orientation. As a young alumnus, Kartik is now giving his time and perspective to students beginning their own journeys.

It is a powerful illustration of how the Morehead-Cain community sustains itself: Those who have benefit from the guidance of others carry that spirit of generosity forward.

Alumni Forum: A community that keeps coming together

Few experiences capture the breadth and spirit of the Morehead-Cain community quite like Alumni Forum.

Since its founding in 1995, Alumni Forum has brought scholars and alumni together to exchange ideas, reflect on their experiences, and explore the questions shaping their communities and the world.

At the 2025 Alumni Forum, more than 700 alumni, scholars, Morehead-Cain Global Fellows, Impact Educators, and guests gathered in Chapel Hill for the largest Forum to date.

Across more than fifty events, attendees reconnected with old friends and built new relationships through SEVEN Talks, panel discussions, and conversations with University and Morehead-Cain leaders.

More than 700 alumni, scholars, global fellows, Impact Educators, and guests attended the 2025 Alumni Forum

The weekend was also an opportunity to celebrate the people whose dedication has shaped the community. At the newly named Mazzocchi Alumni Dinner, attendees honored former vice president Megan Mazzocchi and her four decades of service to Morehead-Cain.

That responsibility was at the heart of the keynote address delivered by Chief Magistrate Judge Karen Stevenson ’79.

In a message challenging fellow alumni to approach the present moment with courage, integrity, compassion, and action, Karen reminded the community that meaningful change requires individuals willing to take responsibility for the world around them.

Her closing invitation, “Let us meet this moment with courage,” captured something essential about the Morehead-Cain community: the shared expectation that leadership is not simply about personal accomplishment, but about how we choose to contribute to the lives of others.

The strength of Alumni Forum lies in the ideas exchanged and the relationships, conversations, and commitments alumni carry home.

Generosity across generations

Morehead-Cain Alumni express their commitment to community not only through their time and relationships, but also through sustained philanthropic support.

For the tenth consecutive year, at least half of all living Morehead-Cain Alumni made a gift to the Program.

That participation spans generations, with gifts from every class since 1957, including 100 percent participation from the class of 2026 and the inaugural class of Morehead-Cain Global Fellows.

50 percent of living Morehead-Cain Alumni made a gift to the Program each year for ten consecutive years

Behind these figures are individual decisions to invest in a shared experience and to extend its possibilities to future generations.

Alumni generosity helps sustain and strengthen the opportunities that distinguish Morehead-Cain: an exceptional undergraduate education, intentional leadership development, immersive experiences, and a community that supports scholars as they discover their interests and pursue their aspirations.

The impact of that generosity goes beyond financial support. Alumni open doors through mentorship, professional connections, summer opportunities, and the willingness to share their time and expertise.

Together, these contributions create an intergenerational community in which each generation benefits from the experiences of those who came before it and assumes responsibility for those who will follow.

A legacy we build together

At Morehead-Cain, commitment to community is both a shared value and a lifelong practice.

It can begin with a mentor who helps a scholar see new possibilities. It grows through conversations that challenge perspectives, relationships that endure beyond Carolina, and opportunities to learn from people whose experiences differ from our own.

And it continues when alumni choose to return that generosity to the next generation.

From Kartik’s return to New Scholar Orientation to the hundreds of alumni reconnecting at Forum and the thousands who contribute to the Program, these expressions of commitment demonstrate the strength of the Morehead-Cain community.

As we celebrate a decade of the Morehead-Cain Day of Giving, we celebrate more than the financial contributions that sustain the Program. We celebrate the people whose time, care, experiences, and generosity make the community what it is.

Every generation has an opportunity to strengthen the Morehead-Cain experience for the next. Together, we ensure that its legacy of leadership, connection, and meaningful impact continues to grow.

Explore the Morehead-Cain Day of Giving.

Also read:

• College as it should be: Turning opportunity into a lifetime of leadership
• Identifying potential: Looking beyond the application to find future leaders
• New pathways to Morehead-Cain: Expanding opportunity for the next generation of leaders