When Barbara Miller joined North Carolina A&T University as its chief advancement officer, she was tasked with helping the university boost its endowment to $75 million by 2020 by raising some $40 million between now and then.
A&T, as the Greensboro-based state university is commonly known, is in many respects a mirror of what has happened in recent years to many public and private institutions across the nation.
A&T has seen a steady decline in annual state funding as budget-cutting lawmakers regularly slash funding for higher education. Federal funding has become harder to come by, with few exceptions. Alumni, never big givers, have been wrestling with their personal financial fallout from the Great Recession. Other private donors, from corporations to foundations, have been belt-tightening, even as they recover from the recession.
“That means we have a lot of work to do,” says Miller, putting her university’s fundraising goal in the real world landscape of challenges facing higher education. “We have an opportunity to grow,” says Miller. She and her full-time fundraising staff of four and other university officials are hard at work on an intensive fundraising plan.
“The endowment is critical, absolutely critical,” says Miller, who was appointed vice chancellor in the university’s office of advancement last year. “The endowment is the future of the university,” she says.
As outside sources of funds level and decrease and many institutions try to hold the line on boosting tuition and fees, the income from endowments is increasingly being looked to as a future source for closing funding gaps for scholarships, fellowships, supplements for teachers and researchers and various light and water expenses.
