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Making Marshall home

Marshall High School grad DeMuth gives back through foundation work

Photo by Jody Isaackson Austin DeMuth is one of those Marshall High School graduates who has come back home to raise a family and make a contribution back into the community in which they grew up.

Editor’s Note: This story is the second in a series that reflect the contributions made by Marshall High School graduates when they returned to the community.

MARSHALL — Most people who make charitable donations feel good about their donations no matter the size. They are doing something to give back to the community in which they grew up or attended college.

Some people go even further than opening their wallets or manning a concession stand. One such person is Austin DeMuth of Marshall. He goes as far as to sit on the board of Pride in the Tiger Foundation, which wasn’t even established until he graduated from Marshall in 1999.

“I never had the opportunity for scholarship and classroom grants to the magnitude we’re doing today,” DeMuth said. “Last year, 46 classrooms received grants (from the foundation) in the amount exceeding $63,500. There were 169 scholarships totaling over $124,000 given out last year as well.”

He explained that schools in Marshall, public or private, could apply for grants to fund subject blocks, buy iPads or provide other technology, hire speakers or even purchase field trip tickets.

DeMuth talked about the history of the foundation and that he had joined in 2008. He has been on the board with 14 to 20 other volunteer board members and served on numerous committees. He even served as president for the past few years, being succeeded this year by Janel Wartner. He has served because he wants to make sure his children have more opportunities than he had had.

“I got involved because when you’re a student in the school system, you’re a ‘taker,'” he said. “Now, at this stage, I want (to be a ‘giver’), to help my own kids. So I want to see the foundation be successful.”

To that end, DeMuth and Wartner attended a National School Foundation Association (NSFA) conference to learn how other foundations are run.

“We went to a NSFA conference in St. Louis. There were over a hundred foundations represented by their executive directors, board chairs and superintendents. We went to find out what other foundations the same size as ours are doing. When we came back, we decided to hire a full-time executive director to run the foundation. The conference really opened up our eyes to the need for it,” he said.

Since then, Pride in The Tiger has hired Allan Vogel to head up the organization as that full-time executive director.

Many Marshall alumni have not yet heard of Pride in the Tiger Foundation, which is a 501c3 charitable organization. Even though the foundation is at a good size right now, DeMuth sees the need to work on that visibility and name brand awareness. He said the new executive director will be addressing that.

“We need to continue to evolve as a foundation to use newspapers, radio, Facebook and Twitter to build our visibility and brand awareness,” DeMuth said.

Prior to his involvement with the foundation, DeMuth had first attended St. Mary University in Winona, a college that his coach’s father attended. Graduating in 2003 with a degrees in business management and business marketing, DeMuth returned to Marshall and obtained a job with U.S. Bank in equipment financing, through contacts he learned of through that same coach, Mike Leary.

One fundraising and advertising opportunity the foundation has employed was to purchase Daktronics signage for the school. Any business making a donation gets an ad on the electronic billboard. DeMuth said that many people find that impressive. Businesses get more for their donation and the advertising fees get deposited into the foundation account to support its programs.

When U.S. Bank downsized, DeMuth took a job at Oracle Tower in downtown Minneapolis. DeMuth said he had worked there six months while he and his wife, Brydie, listed their Marshall house, but called home and said he’d had enough; he was coming home.

“It just wasn’t for me,” he said. “I came back and joined a different division of U.S. Bank.”

In 2014, DeMuth made a career change and joined a popular investment firm in Marshall.

“Now, my coach is also my business partner,” DeMuth said of his mentor. “You never know who’s going to be influential in your life.”

Even though Brydie’s family is all from over by the Twin Cities, they decided to call Marshall their home with their three children: Peyton, 6, Emerson, 5, and Max, 2.

“My whole family’s from here,” he said. “It’s a good place to raise a family.”

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