<p>Um, my guess is that he doesn't know the answer to the question, but suspects that I <em>DO</em> !!</p>
<p>Byerly, you are on f.scottie's ground in this forum. I admire you defending home ground on the Harvard forum until it is crimson with shed blood, and I similarly admire Princeton alumni defending Princeton like tigers on the Princeton forum. </p>
<p>P.S. When one considers that Harvard and Princeton have similar levels of endowment funds per undergraduate student (but which is higher this year?), the alumni of Princeton must be coming through for alma mater reasonably well in the aggregate.</p>
<p>In fact, the Princeton endowment has slipped relatively in the last 10 years, and Princeton does not lead in alumni giving.</p>
<p>Indeed,in FY 2005 it trailed Brown grads, who gave $111,248,034 to $91,028,780 from the Princeton grads. Only Dartmouth grads, within the Ivies, contributed less.</p>
<p>On June 30, 1995, the Princeton endowment was 55% of the Harvard endowment; on June 30, 2005, the Princeton endowment was only 43.9% of the Harvard endowment.</p>
<p>harvard's alumni giving rate, as reported to u.s. news, slipped this year from 47% (4th among universities) to 44% (a mere 6th), leaving it even farther behind #1 princeton at an unchanged 61%. in its last annual giving campaign, harvard set a participation goal of 45%, yet it managed to coax only 39.5% of alumni to contribute, way below princeton's corresponding number of 58.6%. the "downward trend" in giving to harvard has been particularly pronounced, with its 39.5% last year constituting a 16-year low.</p>
<p>Harvard's alumni contributions have consistently been higher than Princeton's per capita, were last year, and probably will be again this year. </p>
<p>Effective fundraising for a school involves more than dunning grads for $10 contributions to "keep our giving percentage up." </p>
<p>Princeton has always been more into the latter, while Harvard, Yale and (lately) Stanford have been more effective in keeping their eyes on the bottom line.</p>
<p>with the highest endowment per capita by a substantial margin, i'd say princeton's done just fine on the bottom line. at the moment, it's in the quiet phase of a multi-billion dollar capital campaign, and unlike harvard, it doesn't have to use the proceeds to buy a bunch of overpriced urban wasteland separated by river and highways, just to meet its needs.</p>
<p>as for per capita contributions, the average undergraduate alum gave $1,018 in princeton's last annual giving campaign. outside the campaign, peter lewis gave another $3,127 for every contributing alum. $3,127 x 32,302 = $101,000,000.</p>
<p>The Allston land - essentially doubling the size of the Harvard campus, has already been bought and paid for, scottie.</p>
<p>I think all of this about the Princeton board being scottie's ground is nonsense. It's interesting, however, that he's somehow the main defender of Princeton over here on CC.</p>
<p>That being said, I agree with Byerly on this one. It's entirely irrelevant how many alums donate money, but only how MUCH is dominated. Harvard fundraised somewhere near $600 million last year, trailing only Stanford, while Princeton couldn't top $200 million, despite a higher percentage of alums giving.</p>
<p>I'm guessing that other than ranking considerations, Stanford and Harvard are happier being flush with cash than slightly more supportive alums.</p>
<p>I'm not saying the number or percentage of alumni donors is "irrelevant" - but that the amount of money raised is what its all about in the end.</p>
<p>There is something to be said for persuading the old boys (and girls) to kick in a token amount, but only if there is hope, some day, of persuading them to contribute more generously. Those $10 donations cost more to service than the contribution is worth.</p>
<p>I have heard that there are some schools (not Harvard, of course!) where alumni assn dues, subscriptions to the alumni magazine, or the purchase of season football tickets are counted as "alumni contributions" for USNews purposes! </p>
<p>I have even heard one shocking report (the schools are never identified in these shocking reports) about an alumni fundraiser who personally made hundreds of $5 contributions "in the name of" classmates in order to raise his class' "giving percentage."</p>
<p>Endowment per student is the key indicator. Not total per se.</p>
<p>Important but not the whole story. </p>
<p>There are economies of scale in a larger institution, and the endowment "needs" of certain graduate school programs and extension schools, etc. can differ wildly. It distorts data for schools such as Harvard and Columbia to divide by a "student" number that includes many part-timers in extension programs.
A school like Cornell - or the Texas or California state universities - which receive many millions in state funds due to land grant status have spending power that exceeds what might be expected from the endowment alone.</p>
<p>The impact on undergrads is basically with respect to financial aid, the fraction of the operating budget paid from endowment income, the salaries paid in order to attract top professors and the range of physical facilities available for them.</p>
<p>of course you agree with byerly, zephyr, since stanford stinks in the category of alumni giving rate. did you ever notice, your opinions seem to align perfectly with stanford's institutional interests and appearance in comparisons here? so naturally, you prefer the total fundraising measure, where stanford (and harvard) are advantaged relative to princeton by having three times as many students, five times as many graduate students, and a full complement of cash-hungry professional schools. and byerly, i've already shown that the average donation to princeton annual giving is in the $1,000, not $10 range. for every $10 donation, there must be a $2,000 donation just to sustain the average. on the endowment per capita issue, your extension school defense is bogus, since EPC is typically calculated using only "full time equivalents" as the denominator. of course, you know this, but just assumed that no one would call you on it.</p>
<p>This is such an error-filled diatribe as to beggar belief. Of course there is a formula to covert part-timers and those taking a single extention course, but there are still thousands of them, and it remains true that such stats as "endowment per student" and "faculty per student" are greatly distorted by including these people. They are not undergraduates at Harvard College. </p>
<p>Did you ever notice that in this case, as with every other, your opinions seem to allign perfectly with Princeton's institutional interests and appearances in any comparisons? You know this, but just assumed no one would call you on it.</p>
<p>Not surprising, since you are likewise a shameless defender of the notorious Princeton "eating clubs" - although there must be just a <em>little</em> shame involved, since you refuse to disclose which of these elitist groups you belonged to yourself, and whether it was one of those which refused to admit women until a Court found them guilty of discrimination.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I have heard that there are some schools (not Harvard, of course!) where alumni assn dues, subscriptions to the alumni magazine, or the purchase of season football tickets are counted as "alumni contributions" for USNews purposes!
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I'm an alumnus of one of those schools, and indeed one year I was invited to a focus group of "contributors," and I was quite surprised to be invited that year, as I only joined the alumni association as a quid pro quo for circulating library privileges at alma mater's excellent library. Yes, I did write alma mater a check, but, no, I didn't think of it as a contribution in the usually understood sense of the word.</p>
<p>as your fellow cantab ted kennedy has shown, there's more than a little "shame" and "notoriety" in belonging to one of harvard's even more exclusive, and still all-male "final clubs." if only someone stepped up to sue <em>them</em>, i have little doubt they'd be found likewise guilty of discrimination. i note that harvard has long since cut its ties with these organizations, but has done little or nothing to diminish their continuing, noxious influence on the student body.</p>
<p>You know Byerly, I've always assumed that in your "real" life (although with the amount you post here, maybe this is your real life), you are a Republican political consultant who works from the Karl Rove playbook--no matter what the question, or what the discussion, always repeat the same negative spin and maybe it will stick. Thus, even when the discussion is about endowments, your answer always comes around to "aha, but look at elitist Princeton eating clubs" (or it could have been cross-admit preferences, ED, Fred Hargardon or one of my personal favorites, Bill Foran, the freshman transfer who according to you almost single-handedly proves that Princeton has a bogus no-transfer policy).</p>
<p>According to most people, both total endowment and endowment per student are good barometers of an institution's financial health and ability to fund growth and programs. See this wikpedia article for a brief discussion, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_US_colleges_and_universities_by_endowment%5B/url%5D">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_US_colleges_and_universities_by_endowment</a></p>
<p>I think that both Princeton and Harvard have or can raise sufficient funds for any programs they are contemplating.</p>
<p>Well, here on the Princeton forum, I suppose positive information about Princeton (such as that posted by the OP in this thread) is always welcome. More threads about what is currently happening at Princeton, and more threads about desirable aspects of Princeton's program, would make for more interesting reading here.</p>
<p>didn't you know, token?: any positive news about princeton here on its own board constitutes the offense of "bragging," punishable by a dozen or more princeton-bashing posts by byerly.</p>
<p>I have never "bashed" Princeton, which is an excellent school, unless you think questioning its tolerance for the eating clubs is "bashing".</p>
<p>well, then i suggest you go back and re-read your contributions to this thread, all twenty or thirty of them. and keep in mind as you do so that this thread concerns, at least nominally and initially, princeton's #1 ranking in u.s. news. i don't think you'll find many positive, or even neutral, statements about princeton or any of its partisans. you'll find, instead, all the unflattering statistics about princeton you could muster, coupled with all the flattering ones about harvard you could, with some personal invective thrown in for good measure. this, as we all recognize but you deny, is your well-worn formula for the indirect bashing of a rival school.</p>