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Characteristics of Colleges That Raised the Most in Private Donations, FY 2017

By Chronicle Staff March 11, 2018

The institutions that raised the most in private donations in the 2017 fiscal year tended to have been founded before 1900. The average year of founding for the top 20 private institutions on the list was 1823 and for the top 20 public institutions was 1863. Only the University of Miami, and the Universities of California at Los Angeles and San Diego were founded after 1900. Institutions that were the most successful at fund raising also tended to have had a higher share of tenured professors on their full-time instructional staff, and to have had higher average nine-month salaries for full professors in 2016-17 than did similar institutions. Public institutions on the list were more likely than similar public institutions to be in large cities, but private institutions in the top 20 were less likely than similar private colleges to be there.

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The institutions that raised the most in private donations in the 2017 fiscal year tended to have been founded before 1900. The average year of founding for the top 20 private institutions on the list was 1823 and for the top 20 public institutions was 1863. Only the University of Miami, and the Universities of California at Los Angeles and San Diego were founded after 1900. Institutions that were the most successful at fund raising also tended to have had a higher share of tenured professors on their full-time instructional staff, and to have had higher average nine-month salaries for full professors in 2016-17 than did similar institutions. Public institutions on the list were more likely than similar public institutions to be in large cities, but private institutions in the top 20 were less likely than similar private colleges to be there.

Private nonprofit institutions

RankInstitutionAmount raisedFoundedLocaleProfessors’ average salaryTenured
1. Harvard U. $1,283,739,766 1636 midsize city $221,382 52.1%
2. Stanford U. $1,129,329,597 1885 large suburb $234,549 33.9%
3. Cornell U. $743,502,739 1865 small city $170,874 59.6%
4. Massachusetts Institute of Technology $672,939,157 1861 midsize city $213,750 56.9%
5. U. of Southern California $668,332,017 1880 large city $173,331 49.3%
6. Johns Hopkins U. $636,910,731 1876 large city $158,283 29.0%
7. U. of Pennsylvania $626,485,118 1740 large city $209,223 58.4%
8. Columbia U. $603,077,208 1754 large city $215,091 28.7%
9. Yale U. $595,886,406 1701 midsize city $216,189 36.5%
10. Duke U. $581,050,570 1838 large city $188,199 34.1%
11. New York U. $567,120,862 1831 large city $190,917 27.6%
12. U. of Chicago $483,470,131 1890 large city $224,811 37.7%
13. U. of Notre Dame $451,433,280 1842 large suburb $175,518 59.6%
14. Northwestern U. $344,298,666 1851 small city $200,268 45.4%
15. Princeton U. $303,393,945 1746 large suburb $206,496 62.2%
16. Washington U. in St. Louis $281,491,088 1853 large suburb $180,207 60.1%
17. Brown U. $241,986,818 1764 midsize city $175,824 63.3%
18. California Institute of Technology $235,881,767 1891 midsize city $198,918 72.8%
19. U. of Miami $221,705,733 1925 large suburb $161,604 56.0%
20. Emory U. $218,501,059 1836 large suburb $166,959 33.7%

•••

Public institutions

RankInstitutionAmount raisedFoundedLocaleProfessors’ average salaryTenured
1. U. of Washington, multiple campuses $553,890,900 1861 large city $137,925 53.7%
2. U. of California at Los Angeles $550,933,540 1919 large city $192,312 44.2%
3. U. of Michigan, multiple campuses $456,132,043 1817 midsize city $167,364 33.3%
4. U. of California at San Francisco $422,172,285 1864 large city $128,088 12.4%
5. U. of California at Berkeley $404,587,975 1868 midsize city $181,998 69.1%
6. Ohio State U., multiple campuses $401,850,260 1870 large city $138,897 49.1%
7. Indiana U., multiple campuses $398,259,543 1820 small city $126,162 49.1%
8. U. of Minnesota, multiple campuses $339,394,147 1851 large city $137,223 48.9%
9. U. of North Carolina at Chapel Hill $325,932,129 1789 small city $152,091 51.9%
10. U. of Colorado, multiple campuses $312,786,332 1876 midsize city $136,476 56.4%
11. U. of Texas at Austin $304,293,616 1883 large city $113,724 55.0%
12. U. of Oklahoma at Norman $302,983,206 1890 midsize suburb $118,548 53.9%
13. Texas A&M U. at College Station $290,458,453 1871 midsize city $140,436 51.0%
14. U. of Virginia $268,406,839 1819 small suburb $165,321 47.5%
15. U. of Florida $267,350,482 1853 midsize city $136,089 62.1%
16. U. of Wisconsin at Madison $258,645,216 1848 midsize city $123,228 44.5%
17. U. of California at San Diego $240,075,664 1960 large city $162,414 47.2%
18. U. of Arizona $219,928,978 1885 large city $129,087 57.4%
19. U. of Nebraska, multiple campuses $210,687,857 1869 large city $125,019 58.2%
20. Michigan State U. $199,927,880 1855 small city $145,899 50.0%

Note: Data on private donations are based on survey responses from 933 institutions to the Council for Aid to Education’s Voluntary Support of Education survey. The survey tracked gifts that were received, not just promised, during the 2017 fiscal year, which ended on June 30, 2017, for most institutions. In cases in which multiple campuses are covered in the total fund-raising amount, the year of founding, locale, salary, and share of tenured instructional staff are for the main campus only. Average salaries cover full professors only, are for 2016-17, and are adjusted to a standard nine-month work year. The percentage of tenured professors was calculated by dividing the number of tenured professors into the number of full-time instructional staff at each institution for the fall of 2016. All institutions on the list except the University of California at San Francisco, which is a special-focus institution, are classified as doctoral institutions with the highest research activity in the 2015 Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. Comparisons in the summary to “similar” colleges refer to institutions with that classification. The characteristics in the table included several mentioned as influential in the 2013 report “Million Dollar Ready: Assessing the Institutional Factors That Lead to Transformational Gifts,” prepared by Indiana University’s Lilly Family School of Philanthropy and the fund-raising consulting company Johnson, Grossnickle and Associates. Questions or comments on the Chronicle List should be sent to the list’s editor.

Sources: Council for Aid to Education (private-donation amounts and rankings); U.S. Department of Education (locale, salaries, percent tenured); university websites (founding year); Chronicle analysis

A version of this article appeared in the March 16, 2018, issue.
We welcome your thoughts and questions about this article. Please email the editors or submit a letter for publication.
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