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Brainstorm: Lives of the Mind Dan Greenberg

Rockefeller's Gift to Harvard

I’ve checked my spam mail, e-mail, caller ID, and even the overflowing wastepaper basket. As I expected, David Rockefeller hadn’t attempted to consult with me before he recently chose to give Harvard $100-million from his personal fortune. The purpose of the donation, according to the official Harvard University Gazette, is “to increase learning opportunities dramatically for Harvard undergraduates through international experiences and participation in the arts.”

Now, none but a churl would want to deprive Harvard undergraduates of an increase in international experiences and participation in the arts. There can be no doubt that the gift, the “largest from an alumnus in Harvard’s history,” reports the Gazette, will be as well spent as such lodes ever are. Also, a nostalgic element in the gift merits notice: Rockefeller, class of 1936, values foreign experience from having witnessed the rise of Nazism in 1933 in Germany; he was awakened to the joys of art through study of art history at Harvard. Moreover, Mr. Rockefeller is free to dispose of his wealth as he pleases.

Nonetheless, it should be noted that giving $100-million to Harvard is akin to pouring precious water into the ocean while parched drought victims look on enviously. At last report, Harvard’s endowment — top of the heap worldwide — stood close to $35-billion. In recent years, with astute management, it’s been growing at 15 to 20 percent annually. Added to that, Harvard takes in $500-million or so per year in gifts, plus some $400-million in federal research grants, and millions more in tuition.

It is dismaying even to consider the possibility that but for Mr. Rockefeller’s philanthropy, Harvard undergraduates would not be getting all the international experiences and participation in the arts that might benefit them. But the implication is there.

A scroll down the latest compilation of endowments in the top 785 colleges and universities (The Chronicle, February 1) shows that we’re down to $100-million by number 373 and just a few million or less in the final 10 on the list. After that, there are thousands of postsecondary institutions, of one sort or another, that possess little or no endowment. By numerous accounts, many of them and their students are having a difficult time financially.

Philanthropy does occasionally come to their assistance — perhaps even Rockefeller philanthropy. But $100-million divided among, say, 20 struggling community colleges, particularly for student financial aid, would make a difference in the lives and prospects of thousands of students.

Another $100-million for Harvard is just a bookkeeping entry.

Posted at 02:29:59 PM on May 6, 2008 | All postings by Dan Greenberg

Comments

  1. It couldn’t be that this fund is in response to the fact that Harvard is eliminating tuition for those with family incomes below $60K? So that these students might have international experiences and participation in the arts?

    This, from Harvard’s press release:
    “The gift’s international component will provide annual stipends for experiences abroad to hundreds of undergraduates who might not otherwise be able to afford to participate.”
    http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2008/05.01/99-donor.html

    Sad but true that Harvard will know how to make money with this money and to spend it well. Quite frankly, many of the institutions I have had first-hand experience with would squander the funds on administrative priorities, with the students as the last of the beneficiaries.

    I understand and agree with the sentiment of the posting. I only wish it were obviously true that giving this money to 20 community colleges would actually affect as many students in lower income brackets. My opinion of higher education administration (from close observation) does not make me hopeful that the funds wouldn’t be mismanaged in many, if not most institutions which “target” the “under-served”.

    — Anti-hypocrisy advocate · May 6, 07:25 PM · #

  2. A rather offensive column.

    — alumnus · May 6, 08:46 PM · #

  3. A completely accurate and timely column.

    — madamesmartypants · May 8, 06:32 AM · #

  4. I agree with #3. Somehow it feels appropriate, though, that one of the descendents of robber-baron-era capitalism would choose to enrich the wealthy in keeping with the goal of continuing to expand the gap between the haves and the have-nots.

    — Ray · May 8, 07:00 AM · #

  5. Yes, #3 and #4 are right on target. Those that have, get more. Any good proposals to change that will surely get my attention.

    — Mollygrubber · May 8, 09:28 AM · #

  6. Every time one of my 4 well-endowed or public colleges and universities calls me, I write a check to the United Negro College Fund

    — gilbert · May 8, 09:32 AM · #

  7. Diverse Education – Cited, William Allan Kritsonis, PhD & Monica G. Williams

    From Diverse Online
    Feature Stories
    A FUNDRAISING BLUEPRINT
    By Peter Galuszka
    May 1, 2008, 12:53
    Howard University sets the bar high for its largest ever capital campaign, and now plans to share the secrets of its success with fellow HBCUs.

    From left, President of Howard University, H. Patrick Swygert, Richard D. Parsons, chairman of the Board of Trustees’ Development Committee, and former board chairman and current trustee Frank Savage celebrate the Campaign for Howard’s success at its halfway point.
    In the fall of 2001, top administrators and trustees from Howard University secluded themselves at a retreat at the posh Lansdowne Resort in the rolling Virginia countryside near Washington to discuss the future of their school. There they planted the seeds of what was to become the most successful fundraising campaign ever undertaken by a historically Black university.
    For Howard President H. Patrick Swygert, the campaign was the latest in a series of fundraising efforts that he had started since 1995 when he took over as president. At the time, he recalls, “It was clear we needed a change. Only 4 to 5 percent of the alumni were participating. About 90 percent didn’t participate at all.”
    The brainstorming at the Lansdowne retreat created an innovative, multifaceted and complex campaign that ended up seeing the school reach its goal of $250 million early and then surpass it by $22 million. The “Campaign for Howard” also serves as a yardstick and an incentive for other HBCUs to improve their own fundraising efforts.
    At the retreat, Swygert drew upon old and young blood. Dr. James Cheek, former Howard president and now-president emeritus, and Dr. Roger Estep, a veterinarian who served as vice president for development and university relations, weighed in with their ideas. Sophisticated financial insight came from corporate luminary and Chairman of the Board of Trustees Richard D. Parsons. As the chairman of Time Warner, Parsons is one of the most prominent African-Americans in global business whose exploits have been fodder for many cover stories in national business magazines.
    Participants were thinking big, indeed. It was clear that they were creating something broad-based that was to be a break from the past.
    “We talked about setting a campaign goal of $100 million, then $125 million,” Swygert remembers. “Then we decided, in a burst of overconfidence that the goal should be $250 million. This would give us a stretch goal,” he says. Even the campaign slogan they came up with was tailored to let alumni know just who they were and how much they had to offer. It read: “Leadership for America and the Global Community.” The campaign kicked off in March 2002 with an end date of Dec. 31, 2007.
    Not only was the $250 million goal reached 10 months before the deadline, it was surpassed by $22 million. The funds enriched Howard’s endowment to a total of $532 million, the largest of any HBCU. As many as 81 individuals pledged more than $1 million each. Swygert, who will retire in June, is now laying the foundation for another campaign aimed at $1 billion in donations that would double Howard’s endowment.
    Why not? he asks. “There are about 31 university campaigns right now that have goals of more than $1 billion,” he says. Harvard University’s endowment is a whopping $34 billion and No. 2 Yale has $22 billion. Even Georgetown University just across the city from Howard has an endowment of $1 billion.
    Setting an Example

    Howard University President H. Patrick Swygert, who is set to retire in June, is laying the foundation for another campaign that would double the university’s endowment.
    Howard’s success offers many examples for its fellow HBCUs. Swygert says he has talked informally to the presidents of other schools about his experience. Meanwhile, Howard officials are taking apart the campaign and are expected to publish a report on lessons learned that will be made available to other HBCUs in coming months.
    There’s little doubt that other HBCUs could use some help. Alumni giving typically falls short of other schools. Endowments are comparatively small. While predominately White institutions have giving rates ranging from 20 to 60 percent, HBCUs typically fall below 10 percent, according to a 2006 study by Dr. William Allan Kritsonis, professor of educational leadership at Prairie View A&M University, and Monica G. Williams, a doctoral student at the university. At Howard, campaign leaders achieved their goals by tapping a number of resources. One was hiring Virgil Ecton, vice president for university advancement, a fundraising guru with experience at the United Negro College Fund. Another was upgrading the alumni offices’ information technology so it would make solicitations cheaply and easily. As Swygert notes, of 66,000 or so alumni, they only had the e-mail addresses of 7,000. “Now we have 30,000 addresses,” he says.
    Direct, personal community outreach was also essential. Swygert, Parsons and other fundraisers held a series of meet-and-greet sessions with Howard alumni in Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami, New York and Philadelphia. Renee Higginbotham- Brooks, vice chairman of the board of trustees and a Texas lawyer, remembers one alumni outreach meeting in Miami in 2004. “It really surprised everyone. It was the first time Howard had ever done that. By the end of the meeting, we had raised $7 million,” she says.
    Another memorable fundraising event, says Higginbotham-Brooks, was held at the gleaming, new corporate headquarters of Time Warner in Manhattan. Trustee head Parsons arranged for the confab among his many contributions to the campaign. Swygert says Parsons played a critical role by staying the course as the head of the campaign throughout its five-year run.
    Indeed, Parsons, one of the most prominent business leaders in the United States, may have been the single most important reason for the campaign’s success. At the time he took over the campaign, he was deeply involved in the troubled merger of Time Warner with AOL and was busy rationalizing the acquisition. Parsons has held a number of prominent posts in state and federal government and serves on the boards of such major companies as Citigroup Inc. and Estée Lauder Inc. He has gained plenty of fundraising experience as chairman of the Apollo Theater Foundation and as a board member of The Museum of Modern Art and the American Museum of Natural History in New York.
    What’s more, Swygert says, Parsons remained as head of the campaign for its entire seven-year duration. Having one person in charge consistently made a major difference.
    “There were no revolving chairs, and I can’t stress that enough,” says Swygert.
    “The Campaign for Howard was a university- wide effort, involving the entire board, the administration and faculty, and students and alumni,” replied Parsons via e-mail to Diverse. “Its overwhelming success reflects the high regard in which Howard University is held by those constituencies and many other friends throughout the country.”
    What’s next for Howard is planning for the next campaign, once a post-mortem is finished on the most recent one. Howard’s endowment has moved up to $532 million, up from $144 million when Swygert took over as president in 1995. He says that the nuts and bolts of the next campaign will be the brainchild of his successor. Fertile grounds for fundraising goals involve using more funds for more student scholarships. Some major universities such as Yale have announced they are wellenough endowed to start giving students from lower- and middle-income families free or cut-rate tuitions. Swygert says that as it is now, Howard’s tuition is highly competitive, but scholarships are a distinct possibility.
    “You must aim high to generate energy and enthusiasm,” Swygert says, “If you are in higher education, you are an optimist.”
    “Dr. Kritsonis and Monica Williams have contributed to the national debate.”

    — William Allan Kritsonis, PhD · May 8, 10:18 AM · #

  8. I’m not sure I’m going to get seen way down here, but I’ll take a chance and say that Rockefeller should only be applauded for giving away $100 million, and yes the money might well have engendered more social good if it had gone to community colleges, and still more—I’d imagine—if it had gone to public schools in Cleveland (where the Rockefellers began their march to power), and even more if it was devoted to AIDs prevention in Africa, and perhaps even more if it could be used in Burma as we speak. But rich folk are just like you and me, and they give to the cultural and charitable institutions they know and which treat them well and in which they have previously invested—fiscally and emotionally. That Dan Greenberg seems to set his posting as a yearning rather than a cry of the heart, indicates he understands this, too. The casting of bread on waters has effects that can’t be predicted anyway. What if one of the less than 10 percent of Harvard students eligible for Pell Grants uses the income from this endowment to travel to X and is so moved by the awful conditions there that he determines to change them any way he can. If memory serves, that’s how Paul Farmer began his work in Haiti.

    — Ben Birnbaum · May 8, 03:15 PM · #

  9. The elites in the United States have no interest in the population of the United States. They have interest in themselves, as elites. With 1/6th of the US population having no parents, healthcare, or jobs, eon after eon, solution after solution, no X behind after no X behind, behind after behind, it is time to consider this possibly not a coincidence. Perhaps Rockefellors enjoy dying early in a society that does not take responsiblity for itself as a whole (research result recently announced), for its poorest 1/6th, and for creating minimal quality human beings that do not steal anything not nailed down (most Americans are thieves, I demonstrate it outside every class by dropping $50 and betting my students how long it takes for it to disappear at various Ivy League and other “top ten” colleges in the US—the longest time, 7 minutes at Sarah Lawrence). The quality of person from Rockefellor to the average top ten jerk stealing 50$ from the floor outside my lecture halls in the US is disgusting.

    — Richard Tabor Greene · May 8, 08:43 PM · #

  10. After living in Europe for a few years, I have come to think that any “thievery” tendency of Americans comes from the lack of any true “social safety net”.

    After all, the U.S. is a society that offers only a few months of unemployment compensation, for example, while western European nations often provide two or three years of subsidized job-hunting. And, of course, all countries only use the number of persons currently on those payrolls when calculating the population percentages – so the U.S. always looks better than its counter-parts. And, of course, there’s healthcare, etc.

    That said, I think it’s generally true that the ultra-rich (whether robber-barons or not) often think in terms of “endowed named legacies” that will last at the very least a hundred years or more — and they often favor an institution over their own children (e.g. recently, Warren Buffet).

    So, in the grand scheme of things, if the nation and the planet survive, will Harvard be around in the year 2108? Probably – celebrating its 472nd anniversary. The local/state higher education institution? Not necessarily.

    And now, Harvard (with the aid of Rockefeller), in a more “blind-admissiions”-like subsidy of the education of some of the nation’s brightest but poorest, is making that second prediction even more tenuous.

    Ah, the ironies of “charity”….

    — Anti-hypocrisy advocate · May 9, 01:53 PM · #

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