While many universities’ alumni donations have been impacted by the economic downturn, the Georgetown Fund, Georgetown’s alumni giving fund received more donations during the 2011 fiscal year, which began on July 1, 2010 and ended June 20, 2011, than in the 2010 fiscal year.
The “Great Recession” has caused an overall downward swoop in alumni donations for American institutions of higher learning during the fiscal year of 2009, with only minor improvement in 2010, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education. However, Jeffrey Donahoe, the Director of Development and Campaign Communications at the Office of Advancement, said the undergraduate alumni giving numbers and trends are positive compared to the year before.
“The overall number of undergraduate alumni who gave was up during the fiscal year of 2011,” Donahoe said.
Out of 17,000 donors, more than 11,500 main campus alumni donated to the Georgetown Fund,this past fiscal year, amounting to about $7 million, compared to only $5.5 million from the year before. The donation size increased slightly from last year for both the Annual Fund and the Georgetown Fund. In 2010, average gift size was $735 for the Annual Fund and $428 for the Georgetown Fund. In 2011, however, it was $755 and $505 respectively.
Although the overall amount of money donated has not been negatively affected, the percentage of alumni who donated has. The 2011 fiscal year only saw undergraduate alumni participation of 26 percent, which “is slightly down from the 2010 fiscal year,” Donahoe said.
“The number of donors can go up and the participation rate still go down because participation is the number of donors as percentage of the total number of alumni,” Donahoe said. “The pool of alumni grows larger every year with the addition of almost 1,600 new alumni. More alumni are being added than lost.”
Although some alumni donate to specific parts of the University, such as the library or Campus Ministry, most alumni donations made to the Georgetown Fund go towards the 1789 Scholarship Imperative.
“[The 1789 Scholarship Imperative] is the university’s number one giving priority,” said Donahoe.
The 1789 Scholarship Imperative lists the goal of awarding 1,789 students annually with $25,000 scholarships each on its website. The increase in donations from 2011 added up to approximately sixty more undergraduate scholarships, which Donahoe said is making a profound difference for students.
“[I think that when donors] can see the impact of their giving in the number of scholarships raised and students supported, they feel the value of their gift, no matter the size,” Donahoe said.
