OT - Texas A&M raises record $740M

Submitted by Cold War on

Johnny Football isn't just helping Texas A&M University on the football field.

The resurgence of Aggies football helped Texas A&M raise a record $740 million in donations during the past year.

The fundraising haul exceeds the university's previous high mark by nearly 70 percent.  It also dwarfed the more than $400 million raised by rival University of Texas during the same period.

Ann E. Kaplan, director of the Voluntary Support of Education survey, told the Chronicle of Higher Education that since 2001 the most money raised by a public university—cash in hand—was $595-million by the University of Wisconsin at Madison in 2005. http://www.dallasnews.com/sports/college-sports/texas-aggies/20130916-football-effect-texas-am-raises-record-740-million-almost-doubles-longhorns.ece

charblue.

September 17th, 2013 at 4:27 PM ^

was the official leader of the cash donation hit parade among all public universities in terms of money raised prior to the Texas A&M campaign. 

Is Michigan viewed as a private or public university in terms of  this categorical financing? Michigan hit the billion dollar mark a few years ago in a campaign of its own. 

But that aside, one of the aspects of Johnny Manziel's closely inspected off-season, was his apparent use by the university as a push button fund-raising tool. With his Heisman in tow, the freshman became an ATM for A&M, and now we know why the correlation between university backing of big time spending on college sports is so related, as if we needed more relevant evidence. 

This is why, of course, that fans or the public at large, should never take the position that the institutions or their memership regulatory and enforcement body, the NCAA, is ever in a greater moral position to preach to the masses about ethics and or taking Johnny Football's word that he never got paid for signing umpteen things for sports brokers, who are simply an arms-length different than what universities are when it comes to raising money from kids they are only interested in teaching and shaping to become productive professionals. 

Strike when the iron is hot. 

ppToilet

September 16th, 2013 at 9:40 PM ^

Raised $3.2 billion. The next campaign starting in November will raise more.

Glad to see so many people giving to higher ed, and hopefully the money is well spent.

gwkrlghl

September 16th, 2013 at 9:55 PM ^

as annoying as Manziel is, A&M's move into the SEC has been nothing short of genius for them. They are fully out of Texas' shadow at the perfect time. It's like what MSU did to us from 2008-2010 times 100

LSAClassOf2000

September 16th, 2013 at 9:57 PM ^

"An official of the Texas A&M Foundation said that 30 percent of the total was “cash through the door,” 42 percent was in the form of pledges, and 28 percent was in estate commitments. The official noted that the university’s historical pledge-fulfillment rate was 95 percent."

The Chronicle Of Higher Education had the breakdown of the money. Not a bad haul - the Voluntary Support For Education survey found that donations overall were up 2.3% overall last year and actually outpaced inflation by a smidge. 

JeemtotheH

September 16th, 2013 at 10:31 PM ^

Holy cow, so why has tuition increased so much in the 2000s? (Serious question. With all the billions of dollars donated why is there still an education bubble for tuition?)

Zone Left

September 16th, 2013 at 11:03 PM ^

Student loans and the facilities arms race are good places to start. Additionally, there's been a proportionately substantial reduction in state funding for public schools.

Donated money is typically earmarked for specific improvement projects, not to reduce operating expenses. The double whammy is that, while many of the projects have money allocated for the first few years of operations, the school eventually has to take over that expense.

Farnn

September 16th, 2013 at 11:16 PM ^

Cheap money.  Student loans are essentially allowing the schools to indirectly borrow tons of money and then their graduates have to pay it off.  For a while it wasn't widely reported because the economy was good, graduates got jobs and the compounded 7% a year hadn't really made it's impact felt quite as much.  In addition, there are a lot more employees at universities these days.  No longer just professors and department heads, but also advisors and councelers and security and PR departments and legal councils and tons of others feeding off the cash flow.

gopoohgo

September 17th, 2013 at 10:10 AM ^

This.  They did a study of the UC system, looking at the number of administrators who made more than 100K/yr.  It has exploded over the last decade, far more than facility renovation, research expenditures, or the decline in state funding.  Bloated staffing + captive audience + cheap federally backed funding = costs skyrocketing past the rate of inflation

BlueAggie

September 16th, 2013 at 10:34 PM ^

It's been a great decade to have the top Petroleum Engineering program. On top of that, A&M didn't really stop being a small pseudo-military college until the 70's. the explosion in former students (alums) is just starting to bear fruit.

BioIsh

September 16th, 2013 at 11:20 PM ^

It's a great time to be an Aggie. Everywhere I go in Texas, I seem to run into more and more Aggie fans. The SEC and Manziel were the best things to happen to A&M.

BioIsh

September 16th, 2013 at 11:29 PM ^

One of A&M's most contributing donors, George P. Mitchell, passed away this year. He was truly a remarkable man who cared a lot about the University.

BlueVoix

September 17th, 2013 at 10:07 AM ^

Aggies always seem like perfectly nice people...but I can't help but feel uncomfortable every time I see or hear about the cadets/yell leaders.

It all seems...kind of weird.

bronxblue

September 17th, 2013 at 10:41 AM ^

Is the fund-raising really because of football, or did they just up their recruiting efforts for financing?  I mean, Harvard generates billions of dollars in fund-raising each year, and most of that comes from government and research grants, not just alumni donations.  I have to think that A&M's growth as a research institution is at least a part of this increase.

MichiganAggie

September 17th, 2013 at 1:35 PM ^

I think estate planning certainly helped. A&M sent out free books on how to wills, etc with a couple chapters devoted to what to do if you decide to donate your estate to A&M