University fundraising officials are looking forward to a generous holiday season to boost The Campaign for Duke closer to its $2 billion goal, but they say it will not likely top that goal before February.
Current funds pledged sit at $1.9496 billion, about $50.4 million short of the overall goal originally targeted for December 2003, according to numbers released by the Office of University Development this weekend. Peter Vaughn, director of communications and donor relations, said that at the current pace and barring any very large gifts, Duke will break the goal in early February.
Vaughn noted, however, that even when the $2 billion is reached, there will likely be areas still left unfulfilled.
The Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences, the Fuqua School of Business and the athletics program are the next three divisions that should break their individual goals--all are within 3 percent or less.
"Some schools may very well go over in the next few weeks," Vaughn said. "Generally, giving is heavy at the end of the calendar year, because of tax purposes."
Two divisions--the Pratt School of Engineering and the School of Law--surpassed their individual goals in July. The remaining divisions are all within 10 percent of their goals, except for the University library system, which, without a specific alumni base, is 15 percent off its $40 million target. Dollar wise, Arts and Sciences is the furthest away, some $31 million short of $400 million. The Medical Center, which had the largest goal, only needs $18 million more to hit $600 million.
"We'll be very happy when we make it [to $2 billion], but there is still a year to go in the Campaign," Vaughn said. "It's a little like the Black Faculty Strategic Initiative. We reached the goal for that a year before projected, but [our strategy does not change] and we continue to recruit minority faculty."
Vaughn also pointed to financial aid, faculty support and facilities as three components of the Campaign that still need help.
Almost 84 percent of the nearly $1.95 billion pledged has been paid, Vaughn said, noting that although contributions have slowed during the current economic dip, the Campaign has not been greatly impacted.
"We have never seen a huge dip," he said. "It's slowed, there's no question, but even over the last two months [when the stock markets have started to rebound], I've personally seen very little difference."
When The Campaign for Duke officially began in 1998, administrators set an initial overall goal of $1.5 billion by the end of 2003. With the strong economy and early success of the Campaign, Trustees increased the goal to $2 billion in 2000.
Development officials will continue to meet with donors over the coming months. For example, a donor dinner is scheduled in Chicago this month, and several more are planned for early 2003.
Of the 20 universities in the nation with capital campaigns of more than $1 billion, Duke is one of five to set goals of $2 billion or more, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education. The University of Southern California has already surpassed its $2 billion goal by $568 million, while the University of California at Los Angeles, at $2.1 billion as of Oct. 31, is still about $300 million short of its 2005 goal of $2.4 billion.
The Johns Hopkins University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are still in the early stages of their $2 billion campaigns. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is about a billion dollars short of its $1.8 billion by 2007 target.
With such capital campaigns, Duke and its peers are attempting to make up lost ground on some of the most-endowed schools in the nation, such as Harvard, Yale and Princeton universities, which, with their long histories, have amassed endowments of over $18 billion, $10 billion and $8 billion, respectively. Duke's endowment stood at $2.37 billion at the end of the last fiscal year.
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