Campaign for Duke passes $826 million

This is the second story in a four-part series on The Campaign for Duke. Tomorrow's will focus on why Duke needs a large campaign.

Five months after Duke dazzled its benefactors with a snazzy campaign kick-off, The Campaign for Duke has become a venture characterized more by hard work and careful study than flair.

At $826,229,179, the funds to date are well past the halfway mark. But the $1.5-billion goal remains daunting; the University must pull in about $2.78 million per week in order to complete the campaign within seven years.

Vice President for University Development Robert Shepard said he is pleased with the early performance of the public phase-which began Oct. 3-ending the three-year "silent campaign" that amassed $684 million. "The overall numbers are actually quite extraordinary. We're above the benchmark in so many ways," Shepard said.

But the numbers only climb through the diligence of the 90 development officers and 1,000-plus volunteers currently attempting to woo Duke's 100,000 alumni through personal contact, telemarketing and regional events.

For instance, 800 Los Angeles alumni and friends enjoyed their first taste of the campaign in early February at a private viewing of the Vincent Van Gogh exhibit. The gala event, which was not a direct fund-raiser, was the first of several activities intended to build excitement in the region. In about a year and a half, Keohane will visit the area and ask alumni to become campaign donors.

Shepard noted the particular importance of such regional events, which attempt to reach donors capable of giving large gifts.

"There hasn't been a successful billion-dollar campaign that had less than 55 percent of its total coming from gifts of a million dollars and up," Shepard noted, adding that his office "feels pretty good" about its progress with large gifts.

Speaking to campaign priorities, Keohane reported that earmarked endowment funds, such as those destined for undergraduate financial aid, have been successful. And, as with most campaigns, donations to bricks-and-mortar projects have been plentiful. But endowment funds geared toward faculty support have lagged. Keohane labeled this problem the campaign's "greatest challenge" at present.

Keohane suggested that donations may be lower in this category because the University has not developed enough creative opportunities for giving.

"Duke has been pushing endowed chairs, which are in some ways the most important form of faculty support, but they are also very expensive, and unless you can give $1.5 or $2 million, they are not options. Duke hasn't had any way to give people who want to give $250,000 or $500,000 an opportunity to support faculty," Keohane said.

She added that by learning from financial aid's success, the University could improve its marketing efforts. For instance, it might establish better stewardship programs to keep donors informed of the usefulness of their gifts. She also noted that matching programs for faculty chairs have been very successful, and should be used for models in other areas.

Keohane also said the campaign might tie intangible endowment gifts to tangible campus assets.

"There are a number of buildings that are named in ways that are no longer appropriate-like Old Chem, which is no longer filled with chemists, and is not even that old, and yet is a very prominent building on the quad. [We are considering honoring] donors who are giving $10 or $20 or $30 million toward unrestricted endowment by renaming the building in their honor," she said.

Another area for concern has been unrestricted endowment, which Keohane noted is key to improving Duke's financial standing.

"The effort to raise endowment in general is going very well," Keohane said, "but unrestricted endowment is tough money to raise. That is not at all unpredictable, but it is proving itself to be true."

Explaining that donors nationwide are interested in giving to actual programs rather than an intangible fund, Keohane said that resistance to supporting unrestricted endowment is particularly acute at Duke.

"Unrestricted endowment for many institutions provides the real bread-and-butter funds. This money is really golden because it will do whatever faculty, administrators and students need to have done-such as relieve pressure on tuition or [subsidize] use of space in the Bryan Center," Keohane said.

"In other places, that argument is historically strong. But somehow, we haven't found the language to make that persuasive enough here at Duke," Keohane added. She noted that resistance to prioritizing unrestricted endowment at the University is long-standing: "When I came to Duke, I was amazed-we didn't even record unrestricted endowment. It got lost in the noise," she said.

Shepard suggested, however, that research universities, unlike liberal arts schools such as Wellesley, do not tend to draw these types of donations. "President Keohane came from a small institution where she was accustomed to receiving gifts for unrestricted giving," he said.

He agreed, however, that particular patterns of giving develop at each school. The University's patterns, he added, have not brought in the big bucks.

"At Duke," he said, "annual giving is very strong." The Annual Fund, which is slated to raise $100 million in campaign funds, raises unrestricted money for the University's yearly operating budget.

"We need to make the same progress on unrestricted endowment, but we're not alone on that," he said, pointing out that many other schools face similar problems, although most benefit from bequests and the large, unrestricted gifts characteristic of older donors. "Remember that Harvard's alumni have been giving since the 17th century," Shepard said.