Report | Vice President for Development
I am delighted to report that the University had another record year in private giving. More than 120,000 donors—individuals, corporations, foundations, and organizations—made gifts and pledge payments totaling $300 million. This surpasses last year’s remarkable total by 16 percent.
We are also particularly pleased to note that matching gifts from corporations reached a new high of $3 million. It is so gratifying that corporations are joining at this remarkable level with donors to make an even bigger impact with gifts.
What an astounding vote of confidence in the students, faculty, researchers, and programs at the University.
In May 2007, we reached a real landmark in The Michigan Difference campaign. We met our $2.5 billion fundraising goal for the campaign that ends in December 2008. While we have met the overall goal, there are still a number of specific goals yet to be met, and we will continue to focus on these in the final year of the campaign.
Joining in the success of the fiscal year and the campaign were more than 14,800 faculty and staff who made gifts totaling more than $114 million, a tremendous testament to their loyalty and generosity. This is the first time the University has had a campaign specifically targeting faculty and staff, and we are greatly impressed by their response.
Along with reaching the campaign goal, we have had some other significant successes made possible by outstanding donor generosity. President Coleman, in an effort to reinforce the importance of both need-based financial aid for undergraduate students and endowed professorships, created the President’s Donor Challenge. Beginning in October 2006, the University matched all donor gifts made towards need-based financial aid for undergraduate students. This Challenge lasts until December 2007, but already 4,500 donors have contributed nearly $15 million that will be doubled by the Challenge.
A gift of $2 million can create an endowed professorship with payments often spread out over five years. To inspire donors to create professorships and to speed up the process so that professorships could be filled more quickly, the President’s Donor Challenge stated that the president would contribute $500,000 towards the creation of each of 20 professorships, when donors provided $1.5 million to be paid in full over three years. As soon as the donor made the first $500,000 payment, the president matched it. University guidelines permit a professorship to be filled once $1 million has been given, so the challenge means that these professorships could
be filled sooner.
The response from donors was impressive with all 20 professorships created by May 2007. This will make a tremendous difference at the University, providing funding for research and other faculty projects and creating a much needed way to recognize top faculty at a time when U-M faculty are much sought after by competing institutions.
As we enter the final year of the campaign, we will be focusing on raising more money for financial aid for students and creating more endowed professorships. We are distinctly aware of how important endowed professorships are as a means of rewarding outstanding faculty, thereby retaining them at Michigan, or as a means of attracting the best faculty to Michigan. Our peer institutions use professorships to recruit our great faculty. Great professors attract top-notch students to study in their programs, and often these students require financial aid to make their dreams of attending Michigan a reality. And, in return, the prospect of teaching outstanding students is a great attraction in recruiting the best faculty to Michigan. It is a real win-win situation as these professors teach and conduct research that has benefits beyond the University while educating our students so they can go out into the state and the world to be the next generation of leaders.
We are incredibly grateful for the tremendous generosity of our donors who make all this happen.
While a financial report focuses on the dollars, our work really relies on people—individuals who make gifts to the University, support our programs, our faculty, our students, and make the University a stronger place for them. This year we lost two icons who were great supporters of the University as donors, volunteers, and as inspiration to others.
President Gerald Ford (AB ’35, HLLD ’74) and Bo Schembechler (HLLD ’05) were men whose integrity and honor, and commitment to Michigan, inspired not only our U-M community, but the world beyond our campus. Their love for the University made it a far better place. As leaders—one of our country and the other of our students and athletes—they have left a legacy that will be felt for generations.
Thank you for all that you do for the University of Michigan.
Jerry A. May
Vice President for Development
