For the second consecutive year, Duke ranked ninth in private gifts received among U.S. colleges, according to the annual Voluntary Support of Education survey released Wednesday by the Council for Aid to Education.
The University received $372 million in charitable contributions, a 15.5-percent increase from the $332 million record set in the 2006-2007 fiscal year.
"It's an expression of confidence in the school," said John Burness, senior vice president for public affairs and government relations.
Peter Vaughn, executive director of alumni and development communications, said the survey accounts for all private gifts given to Duke, which includes actual dollars and the value of intellectual properties and gifts in kind. The survey does not include pledges for future donations, he added.
Although overall donations to institutions across the nation have increased 6.3 percent, the number of alumni donors has decreased 1.5 percent, according to the CAE survey. Alumni giving held steady from its 2005-2006 level, making up 19 percent of gifts in the 2006-2007 fiscal year, according to Duke's Development Annual Report.
"I think that the fact that there are so many more large gifts than there have been in the past may make the more modest donors less likely to give a gift," Vaughn said of the national trend.
He added that an increase in high-profile reasons to donate elsewhere may also account for the trend.
"There have been a number of very visible and compelling fundraising opportunities around the world," he said, citing Hurricane Katrina and the South Asian tsunami in 2005.
Duke does not intend to change its current fundraising plan, Vaughn, noting that he expects total donations to decrease for the next fiscal year due to a sputtering economy.
"If in fact there is a recession or an economic downturn, it is certainly likely that it will affect economics at Duke too," he said. "I really can't compare at this point with the same point last year. It would be a little hard to speculate about this year."
Chelsea Allison contributed to the reporting of this story.
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