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AROUND THE QUADS

Columbia Launches $4 Billion Campaign

President Lee C. Bollinger announced that of the $4 billion campaign goal, more than $1.6 billion already has been raised in cash and pledges.

Photo: Eileen Barroso

The University formally launched the $4 billion Columbia Campaign on September 29 at the Law School during a program that was simulcast to events in London and Hong Kong. At the time of the announcement, it was the largest fundraising campaign in the history of higher education; Stanford unveiled a $4.3 billion campaign 12 days later.

President Lee C. Bollinger announced that more than $1.6 billion in cash and pledges had been raised during the campaign’s silent phase, which began in 2004. The campaign is scheduled to end no later than December 31, 2011. The last Columbia campaign, which ended in 2000, raised more than $2.5 billion.

The campaign seeks to add $1.6 billion to Columbia’s endowment, with special emphasis on financial aid and faculty support. Also sought is $1 billion for new and renovated facilities and $1.4 billion for spendable support of programs throughout the University.

At just more than $5 billion, Columbia’s endowment ranks ninth nationally but pales in comparison to Harvard’s endowment of more than $25 billion. Another telling statistic is that while Columbia’s endowment per student is a little more than $200,000, Princeton’s is more than $1.8 million.

Bollinger moderated a panel discussion on “What We Don’t Know” that included (from left) Nobel laureate and neuroscientist Eric Kandel, health specialist Mary D’Alton, trustee and business leader Vikram Pandit ’76E, cultural critic Margo Jefferson, physicist Brian Greene and historian Carol Gluck.

Photo: Eileen Barroso

One prominent goal of the campaign is to raise $440 million to endow undergraduate financial aid, with $400 million to go to the College. Significantly, the campaign launch came only a week after Columbia announced that, beginning next year, it would replace loans with grants for all students in the College and SEAS whose families earn less than $50,000 per year.

The campaign also will provide faculty support at virtually every school, including $150 million for chairs in the Arts and Sciences. As for new facilities, among the first planned is an interdisciplinary science building to be built on the northwest corner of the Morningside campus, at Broadway and 120th Street.

“We launch this campaign at a critical moment of opportunity that is uniquely ours to grasp,” said Bollinger. “Few institutions of any kind can boast Columbia’s longevity, the breath and significance of what the University has achieved and its capacity to evolve to meet the needs of an ever-changing world while maintaining a firm allegiance to its core values of scholarship and service. How can we, in our time, do the work needed to lift up generations of Columbians yet to come? To answer that question requires the collective commitment of a University campaign, one as ambitious as the academic ambitions it will make possible.”

From left, trustees Richard Witten ’75, Vikram Pandit ’76E and Mark Kingdon ’71 gathered before the program began.

Photo: Eileen Barroso

Four of the six campaign co-chairs are College alumni: Bill Campbell ’62, ’64 TC, Mark Kingdon ’71, Phil Milstein ’71 and Richard Witten ’75. The others are Esta Stecher ’82L and Roy Vagelos ’54 P&S.

Campbell, who chairs the University’s Board of Trustees, announced that contributions or pledges of at least $1 million each had been received from more than 200 donors during the campaign’s silent phase, and that $168 million had been raised through 100 percent participation by the trustees. But he said much work remains to be done.

“Raising another $2.4 billion will take commitment from each of us here,” he told the audience of more than 200 at the Law School for the launch event, and those watching in London and Hong Kong, “and leadership from those who have taken on the task of spearheading the campaign. While it is indeed a significant challenge, I have no doubt that we will achieve our goals.”

A special dessert was prepared for those at the launch event at the Conrad Hotel in Hong Kong.

Photo: Danny Ng Photography

The London group was joined by Provost Alan Brinkley, and the Hong Kong group by Vice Provost for International Relations Paul Anderer. The Hong Kong portion featured the announcement of a recent gift of $29 million in bequests from Robert Yik-Fong Tam ’50 Business, a banker, and his sister, Wun Tsun Tam, an educator, to support a number of faculty positions and provide seed money for the Committee on Global Thought.

The campaign also calls for streng­thening Columbia’s engagement with its more than 260,000 alumni around the world. In its first year, the University-wide Columbia Alumni Association hosted more than 11,000 alumni and friends at 150 events worldwide.

The launch event featured a panel discussion, “What Don’t We Know?” moderated by Bollinger and featuring health specialist Mary D’Alton, historian Carol Gluck, physicist Brian Greene, cultural critic Margo Jefferson, Nobel laureate and neuroscientist Eric Kandel, and trustee and business leader Vikram Pandit ’76E.

The Hong Kong version of the Columbia Lion and a friend hold the launch banner as International Advisory Council member and past Columbia University Club of Hong Kong president Edith Shih ’77 TC looks on.

Photo: Danny Ng Photography

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