Ten years ago, San Diego State University launched a fundraising campaign to benefit the university’s students, faculty and staff. In 2007, that goal was just to raise $500 million. In 2014, the goal was increased by half to $750 million. Thanks to a successful fundraising year so far, The Campaign for SDSU has raised $800 million in its first-ever, university-wide fundraising campaign.
“On behalf of the entire university, I’m extraordinarily grateful to all of our donors,” SDSU president Elliot Hirshman told the News Center. “The campaign has changed every corner of the SDSU campus and impacted our entire university community. It has laid a stronger financial footing for the entire university and created a culture of philanthropy that is critical to the university’s success today and into the future.”
The money raised throughout the campaign supports scholarships, endowed professorships, academic programs, new campus buildings, athletics and KPBS. In fact, approximately $185 million was donated to endowed scholarships while a $25 million endowment from Ron and Alexis Fowler went to support programs within the newly renamed Fowler College of Business.
Other major gifts and milestones that specifically help business students include:
- A $10 million gift from the Lamden family that went to the School of Accountancy.
- Leonard Lavin, former chair of the company Aberto Culver, endowed SDSU’s Entrepreneurship Center, which helped to expand its scope with new speaker series, an entrepreneur-in-residence program and a micro-venture fund for student startups.
- A gift from Irwin Zahn was used to create the Zahn Innovation Center, home of a new commercial and social incubator to guide teams of enterprising students from concept to business plan to market.
While the campaign is officially coming to close on June 30, 2017, the university will continue to ask for philanthropic support, especially as state funding only provides 20 percent of the school’s annual operating expenses.
“Private giving will continue to be the bedrock of SDSU’s ambitions to advance academic excellence, hire and retain top-tier faculty and develop its research agenda,” said Mary Ruth Carleton, vice president for University Relations and Development, who led the 10-year campaign.