Northwestern’s new fundraising target: $5B
School soared past original goal months ahead of schedule
In a sign of just how flush major universities have become in their fundraising, Northwestern University has soared past its five-year capital campaign goal months ahead of schedule and now has a new target: $5 billion.
The Evanston-based university is seeking to raise the whopping total by the end of 2020, which means raising $940 million in about 15 months, university officials announced Thursday.
The new target matches the University of Chicago’s campaign to raise $5 billion by 2019, the largest goal attempted among Chicagoarea schools. It also continues a trend of increasingly ambitious fundraising from private and public universities throughout the country.
The school launched “We Will. The Campaign for Northwestern” in 2014, aiming to raise $3.75 billion in five years. It was the most ambitious campaign among local universities at the time until U. of C. announced a $4.5 billion drive two months later. The South Side school has since raised its target to $5 billion.
Officials said Northwestern’s campaign passed $4 billion thanks to a gift from alumni and longtime volunteers Bon and Holly French, who bequeathed a portion of their estate to the Kellogg School of Management and other university programs.
Bon French, a private equity investor, also is a member of Northwestern’s board of trustees.
“Holly and I care deeply for Northwestern and Kellogg and are proud to give back to the university that has meant so much to our family over the last seven decades,” Bon French said in a statement. “Northwestern has the potential to make a significant and lasting impact on the world through strategic investments in education and discovery, and now is our moment.”
“I am immensely grateful to Bon and Holly, who epitomize the Northwestern spirit through their long-time generosity and volunteerism, and to so many others who have helped us get where we are today,” Northwestern President Morton Schapiro said in a statement. “Their generosity has enabled us to reach our goals faster than we ever imagined — and raised our expectations for the future of the University.”
Five schools and programs have benefited from nearly 80 percent of the giving, or about $3.2 billion: the medical school, athletics, Kellogg, the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and the law school. The influx of funding has helped support new scholarships, grants, professorships, programs and nearly two dozen construction projects, including a gleaming $270 million indoor practice facility and athletic complex.
But Northwestern is tightening its belt in terms of day-to-day operations after years of overspending. In July, Schapiro and his top administrators announced spending cuts that include deferring construction projects, laying off employees and reducing nonsalary expenses in academic and administrative divisions.
Northwestern has stayed ahead of its fundraising pace thanks in part to some of its largest-ever donations in institutional history. Roberta Buffett Elliott gave $101 million, which funded a global studies institute in her name. Now-gubernatorial candidate J.B. Pritzker and his wife, M.K. Pritzker, gave $100 million to the law school. Alum Louis Simpson and his wife, Kimberly Querrey, gave $92 million for biomedical research.
All those donations were given in 2015. Northwestern passed $3 billion in fundraising in September 2016, about 2 1/2 years into the campaign.
Board Chairman Lanny Martin said trustees themselves account for about one-fourth of the giving, or around $1 billion.
“Their generous outpouring of support is a strong endorsement of the long-term vision and direction for the university,” Martin said in a statement.
The new fundraising goal also seeks to broaden the list of benefactors to 170,000 from 149,094 , officials said.