December 16, 1999 | Read Time: 4 minutes
A greater and greater share of the money raised in capital campaigns by colleges,
ALSO SEE:
Percentage of Gifts Made by Top Donors in Educational Campaigns
universities, and private schools is coming from those organizations’ top donors, a new study has found.
Among 171 educational institutions surveyed last year, campaign gifts from the top 10 per cent of donors — those who made the largest donations — accounted for 80 per cent of the total campaign proceeds.
That’s up from 60 per cent in 1996-97 and 58 per cent in 1994-95, when earlier versions of the same survey were conducted. All of the studies were released by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education, in Washington.
The percentage of campaign gifts provided by the wealthiest donors of all, the top 1 per cent, is also increasing, according to the surveys. In the most-recent survey, such donors provided 57 per cent of campaign proceeds — up from 50 per cent and 48 per cent in the two previous studies.
The latest study also found that, for the first time in the survey’s history, the largest percentage of campaign funds was earmarked for endowment (44 per cent), rather than capital projects (30 per cent) or current operations (26 per cent).
While the survey reflects some larger trends in capital-campaign fund raising, CASE officials said that the data should not be regarded as a comprehensive review of such campaigns, even among educational institutions.
The results were based on a relatively small number of colleges and schools, and the institutions included are not necessarily the same from survey to survey.
Nevertheless, experienced fund raisers say the findings in the survey back up what they have observed at their own institutions and elsewhere.
“If these trends occurred in this group, they are likely to be occurring in all campaigns,” said Eustace D. Theodore, president of CASE.
The survey findings highlight another fund-raising issue involving planned gifts. Such gifts, which provide tax breaks and other benefits to donors in exchange for donations of cash and other assets, often take years for a non-profit organization to realize.
That is one reason that CASE guidelines dictate that its member institutions report such gifts at both the amount they are worth currently and the amount they are likely to be worth when they are actually received by the institution. Using only one of those figures could misrepresent to donors and the public the amount of money actually raised by an organization, CASE officials say.
The guidelines also stipulate that, in calculating how much a deferred gift will be worth when it is finally received, institutions must use a particular method.
But only 20 per cent of the institutions in the survey said that they adhered to the CASE guidelines, which have been in place since 1994 — making it difficult to compare planned-giving returns from organization to organization.
The CASE guidelines on deferred gifts — and the lack of compliance with them — are likely to receive more attention when methods of counting planned gifts come under scrutiny by other non-profit organizations.
One group, the National Council on Planned Giving, plans to create a committee next year to explore the need for guidelines on counting and reporting planned gifts among its member organizations, which include all types of non-profit organizations. However, the fact that the planned-giving council’s members are so diverse, says Jeff Comfort, the council’s president-elect, could make it hard for them to reach consensus on such guidelines.
Among other findings in the new CASE survey:
* Although CASE recommends that no capital campaign last longer than seven years, including the “quiet phase” before a drive is formally announced to the public, 7 per cent of the institutions surveyed in the most recent study had drives that lasted longer. That percentage grew to 13 per cent among those with the largest campaign goals — more than $50-million.
* Campaign goals have been growing steadily since 1995. The average campaign goal increased to $5,616 per alumnus in the most recent study, up from $4,592 in 1996-97 and $3,611 in 1994-95.
For a copy of the survey, “The CASE Report of Educational Fund-Raising Campaigns 1997-98,” contact the Council for Advancement and Support of Education at (800) 554-8536 from the United States or Canada, or (301) 604-2068 from overseas. Ask for Item 22007-800. The cost per copy is $69 prepaid for CASE members and $99 for non-members, plus $7 shipping and handling.
