Does endowment of a university depend on its location?

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Yeah, I noticed that in the Chronicle but do all universities report their endowments separate from their long term pool of investments? Is Harvard’s endowment $27.6 billion or is that is that the valuation of its entire pool of investments? If we’re going to compare apples to apples, that’s important information to know.</p>

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Instead of belittling yourself by arguing with a 21 year old like me, why don’t you instead post updated endowment data for other universities? I would be shocked if Duke was the only school that has up-to-date February 2011 endowment figures in the country.</p>

<p>There’s no point in even talking about endowment figures and using them as a criterion to compare universities if the data isn’t completely up to date. Who cares if Notre Dame had a higher endowment than Duke or Michigan had a higher endowment than UT Austin 6 months ago if that’s no longer the case?</p>

<p>This isn’t a discussion having without the most current information.</p>

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<p>LOL, you posted essentially the same list with trivial changes … nobody cares how a plus-or-minus 4% change in an endowment moved some university a notch up or down. List A = List B for all practical purposes.</p>

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<p>That’s a good question and I don’t know for sure. I’d imagine that the endowment as defined by NACUBO has a clear and consistent definition that is different from the long term pool of investments. However, certain universities aren’t as transparent in their filings as others, so I wouldn’t find it hard to believe that a few universities are calculating their endowment figures slightly differently. I don’t think the accounting is being validated by Ernst & Young or anyone for that matter. Public universities have to be a bit more transparent if they rely on tax dollars, however.</p>

<p>“I’ll be inclined to stick with the guy who provided the $7.2 billion figure on the Wikipedia article. I feel like someone would have edited it if it had been as far off as you claim it is.”</p>

<p>Only if you read the Wikipedia section, you will see that the $7.2 billion figure is based on 2008, pre market crash figures.</p>

<p>Bluedog and Warberlsrule, the Ann Arbor campus owns over 99% of the University of Michigan endowment. In 2008, when the endowment stood at $7.6 billion, the Dearborn and Flint campuses combined had an endowment of roughly $60 million.</p>