University of Virginia Library

Alumni Relations

Unlike state universities, private colleges
depend on contributions from alumni and
philanthropists for much of their support. With
no chance at the tax money, they vigorously
solicit funds from corporations, foundations
and private individuals. And, as the
endowments of some of the nation's leading
private institutions demonstrate, this approach
can be quite lucrative - Harvard's endowment
is over one billion dollars; Yale has recently
announced a capital fund drive that it expects
will net $400 million within the next five years.

Publicly supported institutions, because
they can depend on public revenues, have rarely
expended the energy on fund-raising required
of their private counterparts. The University's
endowment, for example, is approximately $85
million. This places it fifth among state
universities, but it hardly compares with the
endowments of the leading private schools.

This, however, is probably a direct cause of
the mediocrity of many state institutions. Their
revenues depend on the generosity of the state
institutions. Their revenues depend on the
generosity of the state legislature; and as recent
events have shown, state legislatures are quite
often unwilling to pay for anything more than
mediocrity. Private sources of revenue can
become, therefore, the margin of excellence in
a public institution.

Despite the fact that the University's
endowment ranks high among state institutions,
its potential has not been touched as yet. The
University alumni groups are only loosely
connected to the parent alumni association; the
alumni themselves receive seemingly conflicting
requests for donations from the Alumni
Association, the Alumni Fund, the Student Aid
Foundation (which gives money to athletic
scholarships) and occasionally alumni groups
from specific schools within the University.
Alumni relations are too often dominated by
athletics; it would sometimes appear that the
only thing alumni are given credit for
appreciating is a winning football team. Many
alumni feel that the state ought to support the
school. And there have been few concerted
fund raising drives.

The answers to these problems will not be
found immediately; but it appears, if we judge
the situation correctly, that the appointment of
Mr. Crawford as Vice President for
Development indicates that someone has been
assigned to find some answers. One thing,
however, is already known: alumni giving is like
going to the dentist - get people in the habit of
doing so early, and they will probably continue
for the rest of their lives. Alumni giving, like
going to the dentist, can be somewhat painful;
but it is, in the end, worthwhile.

The University's Alumni Association has a
life membership plan under which the
prospective member joins through a series of
easy payments. The response thus far has been
less than overwhelming. The money
contributed goes to pay the upkeep on Alumni
Hall; pays for the Alumni magazine; and
underwrites a loan fund which has provided
timely assistance to many students and faculty
members.

None of the funds go to pay for the
recruiting activities of local alumni chapters,
activities which have discriminated against
black students in many cases. The local alumni
pay for these activities themselves. Moreover,
the Admissions Office has assured us that any
student who was dissatisfied with the scope or
the nature of local alumni recruiting activities
would have the full cooperation of the
Admissions Office if he wished to do some
recruiting on his own.

It is probably futile to talk to the present
generation of students in sentimental terms
about supporting the dear old U. and it would
probably be more efficient if all the diverse
alumni activities were centralized and
represented by a single donations plea. But
until this comes about, the best means for a
fourth-year man, who presumably hasn't got
enough money to make a sizable donation, to
insure that the University attains that margin of
excellence is to join the Alumni Association.