Why Make-a-Will Month Is the Perfect Moment to Think About Your Legacy

Every August, estate planning professionals across the country recognize Make-a-Will Month. This is a simple annual reminder to do something most of us know we should do, but too often put off. According to Trust & Will’s 2026 Estate Planning Report, a national survey of 5,000 U.S. adults, only 26 percent of Americans currently have a will, and that number has decreased over the past year.

The same report found that 73 percent of Americans say estate planning is personally important to them. The gap isn’t awareness. It’s the distance between knowing a will is important and actually creating one, and that’s exactly what Make-a-Will Month aims to overcome. 

A Practical Place to Start

If you’re unsure where to begin, our two guides can help. They cover the most common mistakes people make and highlight the essential considerations for building an estate plan from scratch. 

• Avoid These Common Estate Planning Mistakes With Insights From a Seasoned Estate Planning Attorney
• 7 Important Things to Remember When Creating an Estate Plan

What follows here is a different piece of the conversation: not the how, but the why — and specifically, why so many people choose to use this moment to think beyond their immediate family to the causes and places that shaped them.

More Than a Family Decision

For most people, a will is fundamentally about protecting the people they love, ensuring a spouse, children, other family members or even friends are cared for exactly as intended. But increasingly, people are using their estate plan to answer a second question as well: Is there a cause or an institution that has meant something to me, and would I want it to be part of my story after I’m gone?

It’s a natural question to ask during Make-a-Will Month specifically, because a charitable bequest is one of the simplest additions an attorney can make to a will already in progress. It doesn’t require a large estate, a complicated structure or any change to how you live today. It requires one sentence added to a plan you were already building.

How Charitable Bequests Are Making a Difference at Stony Brook

At Stony Brook University, gifts made through wills and estate plans have supported an extraordinary range of priorities. This impact wasn’t built by a few large gifts alone but by many people who chose to include the university in their plans, regardless of the size of their contribution. Estate gifts have funded scholarships for students in a number of different departments, from the humanities to medicine to engineering to the arts. They’ve supported cancer research and patient care at Stony Brook Medicine. They’ve sustained equipment purchases for the Department of Music and shows at the Staller Center for the Arts, helping to shape campus life far beyond the classroom. They’ve built research funds that provide faculty with the flexibility to pursue new ideas. Some donors simply choose to give to the area of greatest need, trusting the university to direct their gift where it will have the greatest impact in the years to come as the world continues to rapidly change.

Some donors choose to let Stony Brook put their gift to work immediately. Others choose to establish an endowed fund, which is a permanently invested fund that supports a specific area every year and helps ensure what matters most to them has support in perpetuity. Many donors also choose to name these funds in their own honor or in memory of a loved one, creating a legacy that carries a family’s name alongside their impact.

What connects all of it is scale, not size. A bequest of any amount, whether a specific dollar figure, a percentage of an estate or whatever remains after providing for loved ones, becomes part of the same story. It’s proof that legacy giving isn’t reserved for the extraordinarily wealthy. It’s built, gift by gift, by people who chose to ensure that a place that shaped their lives would continue to shape the lives of others long into the future.

“Make-a-Will Month is really just permission to do something you already know is worth doing. Every year, we talk with people who’ve included Stony Brook in their will in some way — a scholarship, patient care or research around a particular disease, a gift to a department that meant something to them or that gave them their start in life — and almost none of them started with a complicated plan. They started with a decision. The paperwork is the easy part.” — Executive Director of Gift Planning Shawn T. Mroz

A Gift That Costs Nothing Today

Perhaps the most important thing to understand about a charitable bequest is what it doesn’t require: no up-front cost, no change to your current lifestyle and no sacrifice of the security you’ve built for the people who depend on you. It’s also fully revocable, so if your circumstances or intentions change, so can your plan. That flexibility is often what makes people comfortable including a cause they care about for the first time.

Getting Started  

If you’re not sure where to begin, you’re not alone. Stony Brook’s Office of Gift Planning periodically offers estate and financial planning webinars open to alumni and friends, covering exactly these kinds of questions in plain, practical language. There’s no obligation, you’re welcome to attend more than once and there is never any pressure to take the next step. You can also reach out to the Office of Gift Planning directly. They work with people at every stage of the process and can help you think through your options, whether you’re just getting started or updating a plan you already have.

Leaving a Lasting Legacy at a Place Like Stony Brook  

For many people, Make‑a‑Will Month becomes the moment they realize that an estate plan can do more than protect the people they love. It can also serve as a lasting reflection of the experiences, values and institutions that shaped their lives. A bequest to Stony Brook can create a scholarship, support patient care, advance research, strengthen a department or simply give the university the flexibility to meet emerging needs. It’s a way to extend your impact without changing anything about your life today and to ensure that what matters to you continues to matter long after you’re gone.

If you’re interested in including Stony Brook in your estate plan, our Office of Gift Planning can provide the information you need to explore your options and think through what kind of legacy feels right for you.

This information is for general educational purposes only and does not constitute legal or tax advice. We encourage you to consult your attorney, financial adviser or CPA.