<p>Agreed, operating expenses include all expenses associated with running EC and sports programs. Let’s look at Exeter, using the great link that GMTplus7 provided. Exeter says that it covers half of shortfall in the operating expenses from its endowment, and the other half comes from annual giving and other income. Given that most or all schools probably use the same rough rules of thumb on how much of their endowment to spend in any given year, it’s fair to say that Exeter has more money to spend than other schools do to contribute to the school’s annual operating expenses (of course Exeter also has more students too). But the “operating expenses” reflect nothing other than the school’s choices about what to provide – how many teachers and staff, how many different courses, how many sports teams, how many ECs, and how much financial aid. Two schools that had the exact same amount of money to spend might make different choices on how to allocate that money – one could give out a ton of FA but have fewer sports teams or a slightly higher student:teacher ratio, and the other could do the reverse. I just don’t think that the amount of the endowment necessarily tells you much about FA vs. sports vs. ECs, etc., other than when you’re talking about schools that are wildly differently situated.</p>
<p>Just as a matter of interest I did the math on FA for Exeter. There are roughly 1000 students at Exeter, and almost half get FA, and the average award is just shy of $38k. That means that Exeter is handing out a total of about $18.9M in FA each year.</p>