<p>On January 24, 2008 the National Association of College and University Business Officers (the "NACUBO") released its 2007 listings of college endowments. </p>
<p>The University of Richmond is reported to have an endowment of $1.65
B-b-b-b-b-billion dollars which represented an increase of 19.9% over the prior year's NACUBO report and ranks #44th among the 785 colleges & universities identified in the report.</p>
<p>For the record Harvard, a school located in Boston, Massachusetts, outpaced all other endowments at $28.9 Billion. </p>
<p>Richmond's $1.65B endowment is less than academic peers UVA ($4.4B), Dartmouth ($3B), Williams College ($1.9B), Pomona College ($1.76B) & Amherst College ($1.66B) but larger than academic peers Tufts, Swarthmore, Smith, Wake, Lehigh, G-town, Middlebury, Bowdoin, Lafayette, Wesleyan, Colgate, and of course as is always the case, Richmond is ahead of Buckhell University. Buckhell has an endowment of $599M.</p>
<p>Interesting stuff, and illustrates one of UR's greatest strengths, combined with it's desire to enhance its position in the higher ed world vs. others who are more content to tout their laurels.</p>
<p>A more insightful, valuable slice on this is endowment per student. I suspect UR will fare even better in that ranking. And of course one needs to really look at the availability, use of endowments. Is $10m for left-handed lacrosse players? Is the chess coach's position endowed with another mill or 2? etc.</p>
<p>P.S. A month later, Dow Jones has no doubt diminished the '07 leap. A classic illustration of how statistics might mislead. Here Dec. 31 ... gone Jan. 31 ... :eek:</p>
<p>
[quote]
Richmond's $1.65B endowment is less than academic peers UVA ($4.4B), Dartmouth ($3B), Williams College ($1.9B), Pomona College ($1.76B) & Amherst College ($1.66B) but larger than academic peers Tufts, Swarthmore, Smith, Wake, Lehigh, G-town, Middlebury, Bowdoin, Lafayette, Wesleyan, Colgate, and of course as is always the case, Richmond is ahead of Buckhell University. Buckhell has an endowment of $599M.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I'm not so sure that those colleges you mention are "academic peers" of University of Richmond. Don't get me wrong--Richmond is an excellent school, but I'm not so sure it's a peer of Dartmouth, Williams, and Amherst.</p>
<p>good point on some. maybe WFU, Lehigh, Lafayette, Bucknell, at least in some respects. </p>
<p>btw, when one looks at the overall list, 19,9% return is sorta ho hum, middle of the pack. it's tough to beat the market, but when it's up, it's great. as noted earlier, it was all smoke anyway ... at least for the moment. gone with the wind. who knows what next month might bring.</p>
<p>Get a sense of humor; my reference to "peer schools" was in jest [see reference to "Harvard, a school located in Boston, Massachusetts"; do you really believe that I thought that someone wouldn't know where Harvard is located?].</p>
<p>You are correct, Richmond is not a peer school of Harvard, Williams or Dartmouth but then again if you are honest you will agree that your Middlebury College, another excellent school, also is not a peer of Harvard, Williams or Dartmouth.</p>
<p>Per student endowment is a better way to compare against peers. URichmond was in the top 25 last year ($390K/student) and is probably about the same rank this year (~$460K/student). </p>
<p>I read somewhere else that UR uses 3-yr average return to determine how much to draw out of its endowment.</p>
<p>UR was unofficially ranked #21 for endowment/student last year, according to Wikipedia. $464,000 for this year would have been good enough for 18th last year. I don't have the time nor the desire to calculate the endowment/student for the other top schools to see where we would realistically rank this year.</p>