2/15/2012: The Council for Aid to Education announced the results of its authoritative Voluntary Support of Education survey today. Chronicle story here. On average, giving to higher ed is up 8.2%. Giving to the UO Foundation is down from $121 million for the 2009-10 FY to $93 million for 2010-11 FY. (Official total using PV). These amounts include deferred gifts, unrealized bequests, and so on. Not sure how things like the Jock Box get counted.
I’m still parsing the data, but this jumps out: UO Foundation CEO Paul Weinhold and compliance officer Erika Funk have once again refused to complete the section of the survey giving details on donations to athletics. The RHS column shows what a group of our comparator universities report on average. Those Beavers at Oregon State have nothing to hide, but UO does:
I wrote in October about how the Foundation cut contributions to academic scholarships by $1.6 million last year, while increasing their own administrative spending $2 million. And here is the data we do have on where donation money is going. No real growth for academics, more and more goes to athletics:
Data source here. And the academic side has to pay the tab for the skybox seats for these people.
I fully expect interest in giving to academics to decline further if UO becomes a union shop.