The University's Capital Campaign to raise $3 billion is well underway and currently running ahead of schedule, according to University officials.
"We are having extraordinary success to date, with over $560 million raised by the end of the first year of the Campaign," said Robert Sweeney, senior vice president for development and public affairs.
The Campaign, which was launched Jan. 1, 2004, and is expected to run through December 2011, currently has raised 19 percent of its goal amount even though only 12 percent of the campaign time has elapsed, Assistant Campaign Director Jennifer Wyss-Jones said.
"This campaign is moving far more quickly in its early phases than any campaign conducted anywhere in the last 20 or so years," University President John T. Casteen, III said.
Although Wyss-Jones said the very specific goals of the Campaign are still being finalized, there are many projects around Grounds that are already scheduled to receive funds from the Campaign. Several building plans that are already underway will benefit from the fundraiser, including the South Lawn Project, the Back to the Lawn Project for the Commerce School and the new basketball arena, she said.
Sweeney said substantial sums also will be raised for endowments in the areas of faculty support, undergraduate and graduate student support, including scholarships and loan funds as well as current operating support.
The Campaign still is in the beginning stages since it is not scheduled to be publicly launched until late 2006. Wyss-Jones said the initial phase of fundraising involves contacting benefactors the University considers to be generous donors. She said by collecting major donations in the early phase, the University can gauge the success of the Campaign.
"Another thing about going to those most generous donors at the beginning is that by the time we get to the end of the Campaign, it might have been five or six years since their first gift, so they might be ready to make a second gift," Wyss-Jones said.
After the initial phase of the Campaign is completed, fundraising moves to regional campaigns and then to a phase where the focus shifts to general supporters.
Students and University families also will be informed of the Campaign efforts.
"We want to make sure that our students understand why we're in this Campaign and what the goals are, so we will definitely be getting them information," Wyss-Jones said. "And we are hoping that they will feel that they and their families are stakeholders in the University and will want to support it."
The ambitious Capital Campaign is the largest campaign in the history of public education to date and is the second-largest campaign ever announced, Sweeney said. He also pointed out that Harvard University only recently claimed the number one spot when it announced plans for a $6 billion campaign.
Casteen said the Campaign "is essential to the University's future -- a point underscored by both the ongoing insufficiency of state appropriations and the broad base of legislative support for the governance and management reforms that are now moving through the General Assembly."
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