Barry Franklin, ’81, had financial help to attend NIU and he and his wife, Debbie, are now happily giving back to his alma mater after he’s built a career as an actuary.
 

The Franklins have supported students in a variety of ways, including establishing their own Barry and Debbie Franklin Student Engagement Fund. Establishing the fund was suggested by Christopher McCord, associate dean for academic administration and professor in the Department of Mathematical Sciences. 

“When Debbie and I decided to endow a scholarship fund, Dr. McCord suggested the engagement fund as a means to enable students to gain experiences beyond basic education that might otherwise be unattainable,” Franklin said. “This includes such things as attendance at industry conferences, purchasing data and materials for research projects, and so on. I have certainly benefited from those types of experiences in my career and want others to have the same opportunities.”

Franklin applied for and was awarded the NIU University Scholar Award and the NIU Alumni Association Scholarship, which he said made the decision to attend NIU easy. Receiving that scholarshiop inspired him to give back.

"The University Scholar Award enabled me to attend NIU without having to take out loans and also required me to develop and maintain the discipline needed to maintain my grades," he said. "I felt very fortunate to have been awarded that scholarship and wanted to ensure others had similar opportunities.”

Franklin grew up in Palos Heights, Illinois, with three siblings – two older brothers and a younger sister. His sister Patty had Down syndrome and died from related complications in her mid-30s, something that impacted him greatly.

“Having Patty in our family was truly a gift, and taught me a lot about patience and empathy, and the value and importance of every individual,” Franklin said.

Franklin’s high school orchestra and jazz band conductor was an NIU alumnus and always spoke highly of NIU’s music program. While a junior in high school, Franklin visited NIU with other high school musicians to attend music workshops and see a performance of the NIU Jazz Ensemble.

“While I didn’t intend to major in music in college, I enjoyed the campus visit and had a good impression of the school,” he said.

Like many of his friends at NIU, Franklin was a first-generation college student.

“NIU fit the bill quite nicely for someone who didn’t have a family college tradition to uphold or certain idealized expectations of a college experience,” he said. “I think NIU still fulfills that first-generation role.”

When Franklin arrived on the NIU campus, he dove in and took full advantage of the student experience.

“A lot of my friends from high school who attended NIU chose to live off campus after their freshman year, but I really enjoyed my dorm experience and stayed in Lincoln Hall until my last semester, when I moved to a rental house just to have the off-campus experience,” he said. “I participated in intramural sports, was elected to the Student Association Senate and served on the NIU Speakers Committee, becoming chairperson my senior year. I also worked as an undergraduate teaching assistant for the mathematics department and tutored several students.”

Franklin describes himself as self-sufficient and independent, and NIU allowed him as a student to maintain that independence.

“I selected my classes without much, if any, guidance from the university or my family and found all I needed in the course catalogue to ensure I took the classes I needed to graduate with my chosen degree, a Bachelor of Science in probability and statistics, with a minor in economics,” he said. “I also found elective courses that supported my actuarial career goal, in accounting, finance, computer sciences and so forth. I also took early morning classes just about every semester, reinforcing the need to get up and get going every day.”

Franklin recalled that school had come easily to him and that he took that for granted. He knew he needed to maintain a 3.3 cumulative GPA to keep his scholarships and there was a point where he said he had to buckle down to build his GPA back up so one bad grade wouldn’t cost him the scholarships.

“That served me well, because I learned how to study technical subjects on my own instead of relying solely on classroom learning,” he said. “It turns out I needed to have that discipline in order to complete the actuarial exams after graduating, and I did graduate from NIU with exactly a 3.3 GPA.”

Franklin spent his entire career in the actuarial field, beginning as a trainee at Allstate Insurance in Northbrook shortly after graduation and continuing in the field until his retirement in 2023. He completed his exams and became a fellow of the Casualty Actuarial Society in 1993 and has been an active volunteer with the organization since then. He was recently selected president of the organization.

“Being nominated and elected by the 11,500-plus members of the CAS is the culmination of over 30 years of volunteering for the organization, including previous roles on the Executive Council and the Board of Directors, and is both gratifying and humbling,” he said.

Some of Franklin’s career highlights include earning his first managerial role, completing his CAS designations, and taking his first consulting role in a different part of the country, which required him to move his family to Atlanta.

“All presented tremendous personal and professional growth opportunities,” he said.
 

Franklin said he was able to continue his success with Debbie’s support.

“I have had a number of mentors over the span of my career who both encouraged and challenged me, but I would not have been nearly as successful without the support of my wife,” he said. “Completing the CAS exams is a grueling process and places demands on family, with a lot of early mornings, late evenings and weekends spent studying. Moving our family to Atlanta, and later back to Chicago, was certainly disruptive to Debbie’s life and those of our four children, but they all made the best of things and experienced a lot of personal growth themselves.”

It is important to Franklin to stay involved and keep learning.
 

“One of the biggest lessons in my professional career is that completing your education, whether undergraduate, post-graduate or professional certification, is just the beginning of your learning, and technical skills are just table stakes,” he said. “Soft skills are essential for success, and in many ways are harder to develop and hone, because each of us is wired differently and authenticity is important, so you really can’t fake it.”

By continuing to be involved with his alma mater, including his role on the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Dean’s Advisory Council, Franklin has enjoyed meeting McCord as well as Dean Robert Brinkmann.

Franklin encourages other alumni to give back to NIU, even if it isn’t a large amount. 

“I began donating regularly to the NIU Foundation not long after graduation, but my donations were rather modest - we had children relatively early and money was a bit tight,” he said. “We support other causes as well, which I suppose we all do if financially able, but we have been blessed in many ways and felt this was an opportunity to pay it forward by repaying the gift I had received as a young adult.”

He added, “It is a privilege to be able to give in this way and I encourage others to consider how they might also pay it forward.”

For more information on being a philanthropic Huskie, click here!