Million-Dollar Mystery: Anonymous Donors Even the Colleges Don’t Know

In college fund raising, anonymous donors typically aren’t truly anonymous. Someone on campus — the president, or a top fund raiser who worked with the donor — knows the identity of the person who gave the gift.

But in the last few weeks, that truism has changed for at least nine colleges. Those lucky institutions have received gifts totaling more than $45-million from donors who don’t want to reveal their identity at all, the Associated Press reported.

The colleges learned of the donations through lawyers or other middlemen, and received the money in cashier’s checks or checks from a law firm. Some institutions, including the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, had to sign a confidentiality agreement saying they would not try to find out who the secret donors were.

Norfolk State University received $3.5-million anonymously. Phillip D. Adams, vice president for university advancement, told the AP that in almost 30 years of fund raising, “This is the first time I’ve dealt with a gift that the institution didn’t know who the donor is.”

Other colleges that received top-secret gifts recently include Purdue University ($8-million), the University of Southern Mississippi ($6-million), the University of North Carolina at Asheville ($1.5-million), the University of Maryland University College ($6-million), and Pennsylvania State University at Harrisburg ($3-million).

It’s unclear if the gifts come from the same person or persons. All came with instructions that most of the money must be used for student scholarships, and all required that the colleges not investigate the identity of the givers. —Kathryn Masterson