Personal Giving Stories

Moy Gives Back with Charitable Trusts to Help Future Students Achieve Success

Wai Won Chin Moy (’59 LAS) and
granddaughter Deanna Wood celebrating
Lunar New Year at retirement community

At 87 years old, Wai Won Chin Moy,’59 LAS, is thankful for her education and the life it has helped provide. Moy earned a degree in chemistry from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and received two master’s degrees from other universities—including one in environmental engineering, which she earned at the age of 42. She began her career in research at a Chicago hospital and went on to be an engineer for the Long Island Lighting Company in New York.

A fulfilling life and fond memories of her time at Illinois have led her to establish two charitable remainder unitrusts with the University of Illinois Foundation. Her gift will provide payments to her for life and then two grandchildren for up to 20 years. In the end, the remainder will support two areas at Illinois including chemistry. “I hope it will help someone like me to finish college and make a good life,” Moy says. “I get a charitable deduction and am leaving something for my grandchildren to remember me.”

Moy came from China to Cicero, Illinois, where her family lived and worked at her father’s restaurant. “When you are poor, the only way out is education,” Moy remarks. “Chinese [culture] always admires education and considers it as a way out of everything.” Arriving with a scholarship in 1957, Moy remembers wonderful discussions at Noyes Laboratory and recalls her welcoming roommates at the Stratford House. “The girls slept in an unheated dormitory,” Moy says, “but they all looked after me and insisted that I sleep in the bed in our heated study room.”

Through her gift, Moy is looking after not only her grandchildren but future Illinois students who will benefit from her generosity to help them achieve their own academic and career success.