Contact: Camille Stevenson

STARKVILLE, Miss.—Joseph Loviza of Vicksburg has established a Loyalty Scholarship in Mississippi State University’s College of Education to honor his daughter and fellow MSU alumnus, Kathleen Loviza Miles.

Miles, also of Vicksburg, is a 1995 communication graduate of the MSU College of Arts and Sciences and a former alumni chapter officer. The newly created scholarship bearing her name will provide annual support for entering freshmen and community college transfer students.

Candidates for the Kathleen Loviza Miles Loyalty Scholarship must be fulltime students in the College of Education who have earned a minimum 3.0 grade-point average (on a 4.0 scale) and demonstrated leadership ability. Recipients will be awarded on a year-to-year basis and may be considered to receive the award for up to four years given their compliance with the selection criteria. 

Loviza is a longtime supporter of MSU and the College of Education, where he earned three degrees and served as an adjunct faculty member for 12 years. After graduating from Hinds Community College in 1960, Loviza received bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education from MSU in 1967 and 1971, respectively. He later earned an Education Specialist degree from MSU in 1976.

A veteran of the U.S. Navy, Loviza began his career with the Vicksburg Warren school system as director of vocational, technical and adult education. He was the first employee of the Hinds Community College Vicksburg-Warren campus, where he served 20 years as director, and later as dean. Following his retirement, Loviza served as mayor of Vicksburg from 1993 to 1997. 

During his career, Loviza was named the Outstanding Vo-Tech Educator in 1987 and Outstanding Marketing Educator in 1992 for the Vicksburg Warren School District. In 2014, Hinds Community College named the Vicksburg-Warren campus multi-purpose building in his honor.

As a Loyalty Scholarship, Loviza’s gift is eligible for a matching contribution from the MSU Bulldog Club, which currently provides up to $500,000 annually for Legacy and Loyalty Scholarship gift matches. The organization’s ongoing commitment to grow these annual awards increases the university’s ability to attract emerging scholars.

For more information on how matching gifts can help establish scholarships in the MSU College of Education, contact Trish Cunetto, director of development, at 662-325-6762 or tcunetto@foundation.msstate.edu.

Mississippi State’s College of Education is online at https://www.educ.msstate.edu.

MSU is Mississippi’s leading university, available online at www.msstate.edu.