Harvard University’s vast endowment grew by $2-billion in the fiscal year just past, the Associated Press reported today, and now is worth $36.9-billion. The value of the increase, which represented an 8.6-percent return, exceeded the total value of all but a few other college endowments.

The increase outpaced that of other large institutional funds. The growth was built on investments in bonds, commodities, timber, agricultural land, and real estate, according to The Wall Street Journal. Big gains in those categories more than offset losses in equities and some hedge funds.

The endowment’s growth, in the fiscal year that ended on June 30, was the work of internal and external money managers supervised by Mohamed A. El-Erian, who stepped down as president and chief executive officer of the Harvard Management Company in November 2007, and Robert Kaplan, a Harvard business professor who replaced him on an interim basis. Jane Mendillo took over on July 1 as the management company’s new chief. —Andrew Mytelka