Bit by byte, a new day is dawning in educational advancement. Fading fast is the era dominated by viewbooks, alumni magazines, and campaign brochures. Technology is reshaping the way colleges and universities teach students, communicate with constituents, relate to alumni, and appeal to donors. The way constituents communicate with each other is…

The changes and uncertainty people have seen in the economy over the past 20 months have created a paradigm shift in fundraising. This has certainly been the case at Holy Cross, a Jesuit liberal arts college of 2,900 students in Massachusetts, as it has been forced to rethink its strategies and adapt in creative ways to the new reality. Other…

Using three waves of the Center on Philanthropy Panel Study, a module of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, fielded by the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan, we examine characteristics of donors who gave to any level of education in each of the years studied (2000, 2002 and 2004). We find that these persistent donors to…

Institutionally related foundations have played a vital role in raising and managing private resources in support of public institutions of higher education. Unlike private grant-making foundations, college and university foundations are typically incorporated as public charities under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Although they…

The primary purpose of this study was to examine the annual revenue received by United States public Community College Foundations from 2008-2009 in relation to selected variables associated in the literature with successful foundation performance. This study also collected longitudinal data by replicating and expanding upon a similar study…

This article discusses Georgetown University's Discovery Initiative, an advancement program in which students and recent graduates meet with alumni who are not currently involved with the Washington, D.C., university. Currently, the Discovery team consists of 50 students who conduct interviews in the Washington, D.C., area during the school year…

A survey of online fundraising by the "Chronicle of Philanthropy" found that 192 nonprofit organizations raised $1.1 billion online in 2007 and $1.4 billion in 2008. Given this trend, to what extent are educational institutions using and succeeding with online fundraising? Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) explored this…

Asking constituents to rally around a cause and make stretch gifts when they're already suffering unprecedented hits to their personal finances sounds more like a fool's errand than a best practice in fundraising. The economic crisis has added a tricky new aspect to operating in campaign mode, but savvy fundraisers haven't given up, scaled back,…

The purpose of this article is to provide a better understanding of the history of fundraising in black college communities; to complicate understandings of white involvement in black college fundraising; to understand the role of fundraising, that is, fundraising for social change and social justice, during the period that followed the…

Community colleges are facing record enrollments and declining state and local funding, and many leaders of these institutions see increasing private support as critical for colleges. In 2010 the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) conducted a national survey of community college foundations. The survey, drafted with the…

Integration of alumni relations and development is vital to institutions. In this article, the author talks about integration and focuses on the functions of alumni relations and fundraising, and the symbiotic relationship between them. He suggests that the best alumni relations officers understand the direct relationship of their work to resource…

This historiographic essay urges a reappraisal of the revisionist view of philanthropy and African-American higher education in the nineteenth century as hegemonic by adopting agency as a theoretical framework to excavate the institutional histories and other primary sources on the northern black colleges--specifically Wilberforce University--for…

Corporate philanthropies can provide much-needed support to K-12 and postsecondary education efforts. This article analyzes whether select multi-billion dollar corporate philanthropies continue such support and adhere to best-funding practices during an economic downtown. Drawing on interview and document review data, the authors examine the…

The purpose of this study is to better understand the characteristics that lead to revenue generation in K-12 education foundations. I reviewed higher education and K-12 education fundraising research literature to identify factors that might be related to success in private revenue generation. The review revealed three key factors explored…

Principal gifts are very large donations that take years to cultivate and potentially can have a major impact on an institution. Venerable private research universities have sought principal gifts for decades with well-staffed, systematic cultivation and stewardship programs. Until recently, however, principal gifts were not necessarily considered…