Bodie Allen, a sophomore in the WVU Chambers College and the Porterfield Scholarship's inaugural recipient.
When Antonia “Toni” Porterfield met with Joshua Hall, Milan Puskar Dean of the West Virginia University John Chambers College of Business and Economics, she came with a unique scholarship proposal and one non-negotiable requirement: the money wasn’t to go to straight-“A” students.
The WVU alum and former professor had a vision for this scholarship. It would go to students with “C” averages, students who had been on academic probation, students holding down multiple jobs while trying to earn their degrees. Students, put simply, just like her.
“My idea for the scholarship was based on my experience,” Porterfield said. “Just because you’ve been on academic probation and you lose your scholarships, that doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to get some help.”
Bodie Allen
It took Porterfield nine years to earn her undergraduate degree. The Wheeling native bounced from two smaller schools before landing at WVU. She worked two jobs, one for 40 hours a week, another for 20, while attending classes. The toll of her efforts was inevitable, but no less devastating.
“I myself was on probation a couple of times,” she said. “When you’re working two jobs, it’s pretty hard to stay awake to study, even when you’re young.”
But she persevered, obtaining her bachelor’s and master’s degree from WVU and beginning work on her doctorate. She became an instructor at the University, teaching marketing and management, work she loved deeply.
For five years, that passion carried her as she juggled courses at WVU and moonlighted at Fairmont State University. But love didn’t pay the bills. Porterfield said she often ended the month with little money to spare, sometimes surviving on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. When a new dean expressed uncertainty about her prospects for tenure, she found herself faced with a difficult decision.
Around that time, she met her husband to-be who lived in Louisville, Kentucky. Weighing her options, she left academia and accepted a position with Brown & Williamson Tobacco in Louisville, earning twice her teaching salary.
“It’s hard to leave something you love for something you don’t know about,” she said. “But I said, ‘It’s time I go practice what I’ve been preaching for years.’”
It was a leap of faith that changed everything.
Bodie Allen
From the classroom to corporate America
She went on to build a decorated corporate career that took her from Louisville to Detroit, Chicago, Baltimore, and finally Jacksonville, Florida, with a few stops in between. After Brown & Williamson Tobacco, she shifted to the auto industry, taking a role at Chrysler during the company’s financial crisis, even negotiating a higher salary to reflect the risk.
Porterfield later moved into insurance, serving in professional roles with Travelers Insurance, Universal Underwriters Group and Main Street America Group, where she spent 11 years before retiring. Though her career carried her across industries and cities, her passion for teaching never faded.
“Most of it was hard work,” she said. “I went backwards in pay two or three times moving from company to company, but I was lucky enough to always be able to make it up. It’s been an amazing experience. My life has been much better than I ever thought it would be. I loved teaching. That was really, really hard to leave teaching, but it all worked out for the best.”
The solid determination that carried Porterfield from academic probation to the executive suite runs through her family. “There were no millionaires in my family. I don’t think there were even any thousandaires,” she said. “They’re all just hard-working people.”
Her most vivid lesson in generosity came from a story told of her grandmother during the Great Depression. Porterfield said that although the family never owned a house or car, her grandmother “had this big garden in the backyard and she made bread every day. She put a sign out on her front stoop that said ‘If you need a cup of tea and a slice of bread, stop here.’”
When Porterfield’s grandmother died at 95, four people who had ridden the rails through Wheeling during the Depression and benefitted from her generosity attended the funeral — 75 years later.
“They said, ‘We knew it was hard for your grandmother, even the part with the tea and bread, but she was always ready for us,’” Porterfield said.
Bodie Allen
Paying it forward
What once pushed Porterfield to succeed now drives her to give back. A year and a half after her husband’s passing, she took time to reflect on her life, her finances and what she could share without overextending herself. With no children of her own, she considers all students “her kids” and could now invest in the profession that had given her so much purpose.
“I just think that giving back is so critically important,” Porterfield said. “A lot of people give because their children need help, so I look at the academic world and students there that need support, they’re like my kids. I’m just helping them out.”
Returning to WVU for the first time in years, Porterfield met with Dean Hall and toured Reynolds Hall for a visit that tapped into nostalgia. “It was great to see the facility that was built for business and economics,” she said.
During the meeting, she shared her idea for a scholarship with unconventional criteria. The dean admitted he wasn’t sure how it would work, noting that scholarships typically go to “A” and “B” students, Porterfield said.
“I don’t want it to be typical. If you can’t make it happen, then I’ll go somewhere else and give the scholarship money to somebody who can,” she said, “I really wanted it to be my alma mater.”
Hall made it happen.
“When Toni came to see me I thought, ‘What a blessing and a great example of what makes WVU so special,’” Hall said. “Here is someone seeking me out because she just wants to help a struggling student overcome adversity.”
Hall turned his focus to deciding who would fit that mold. He worked with the Chambers College undergraduate programs team to determine that the scholarship could go to the student with the largest GPA increase in the GPA Recovery Program.
Through services including workshops and coaching, provided by retention specialist Marlenea Brand, students are able to emerge out of academic probation.
“Toni’s vision gave us the opportunity to give students who have worked so hard to get off probation an even bigger boost,” Hall said. “To me, the existence of this scholarship is at the core of what it means to be a land-grant business school. We will never be the type of school who admits students already on third base and proudly proclaim we helped them hit a triple. We meet our students where they are and give them the resources to succeed in spite of adversity. And we could not do it without donors like Toni.”
Bodie Allen
The comeback
Porterfield’s unique proposal has started to take shape with Charleston native Bodie Allen, a sophomore in the Chambers College and the scholarship’s inaugural recipient. After struggling during his freshman year, Allen committed to the resources provided by the college and University, significantly improving his GPA and regaining solid academic standing.
“When I was put on academic probation I felt like I had let my family down,” Allen said. “So I tried my hardest and went to all of the requirements for academic probation. I thought it was a punishment at first, but then I realized that it was a gift from Chambers to help me with my academics.”
Allen learned he’d won the scholarship, officially known as the “Porterfield Scholarship,” in May 2025.
“The scholarship has definitely changed my mindset. Before, I was really stressed and felt pressured to get the grades to make college worth it for my parents because they were paying for it,” Allen said. “The financial aid is now allowing me to go here for free. I am so thankful for it, and it has relieved so much stress from my family.”
The financial assistance has been transformative.
“Receiving this scholarship means the world to me,” he said. “I’ve always wanted to go to college and pursue higher education. I knew it was a lot of money, but getting this for redeeming myself feels so great, and I’m so grateful to be a recipient. My future feels easier to achieve with it.”
Funding for the Porterfield Scholarship is awarded the semester after the student gets off probation. The money helps offset tuition since scholarship funding is lost once a student is on probation.
For Porterfield, the financial assistance is a message of hope to students who refuse to quit even while struggling, working multiple jobs or on academic probation.
“There’s always hope,” she said. “There will always be people that are thinking about you and caring about you. So don’t give up.”
She hopes her scholarship gift, and her story, will inspire others to support students who may not fit the traditional mold of academic success but possess something equally valuable: the grit to keep trying.
“Buck up, cupcake, and move on,” Porterfield said with a laugh, then more seriously, “You get given the one life, make the best of it while you can.”
Read more feature stories from WVU Stories.