Although endowments at two-year colleges cannot compare to similar funding at a typical powerhouse university, community college endowments have grown an average of 76 percent over the past 20 years, according to the Center for Community College Advancement at the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE). Foundation creation among…

School districts across New York are constrained from fully exploiting a potential source of revenue to help offset pressure on local taxes. The revenue source in question is commercial advertising--including signs, sponsorships and facility naming rights, especially for athletic facilities. Experience in other states suggests New York school…

In an increasingly challenging financial period for K-12 public education in Pennsylvania, more school districts are turning to school-supporting foundations to fill the funding gap. Initially spurred by reduced investments in public education in California in the 1970s, school foundations did not begin gaining traction in Pennsylvania until two…

The glory days of high school sports are no longer reserved for dream team athletes, as athletic directors are increasingly opening up sports to all students, regardless of ability, and seeing winning results on the field and off. This push is reflected in the most recent National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS) survey, which…

From its founding as a Quaker school for boys to its evolution into a military school and, ultimately, into the thriving coeducational civilian institution it is today, Widener University has been no stranger to change and transition. It may come as a surprise, therefore, that although it had a mission statement and goals, prior to 2004 the…

In an era of diminished state and community resources for higher education, community college alumni are increasingly viewed as an undefined and untapped source of support by their alma maters. Community college presidents and advancement professionals find themselves faced with the dilemma of how to develop and define meaningful and philanthropic…

It takes one sweet company to make an industry collaboration work! Hershey Entertainment and Resorts is that company! The company is best known for its resort and entertainment entities. As background, it is important to understand the philanthropic history of the company, Milton Hershey, and the town he built on chocolate. Milton Hershey left…

The idea behind integrated advancement is simple and dates back to the 1990s: A strong relationship between advancement offices conserves resources. It leads to a more efficient workforce. It portrays a highly unified message to stakeholders, including donors, alumni, local officials, and opinion leaders. In short, the entire advancement team…

Just a few years ago, the University of Notre Dame averaged about six mega gifts--$10 million or more--a year. Last year, however, the Fighting Irish received only one such donation. "That multimillion donation has become more difficult to obtain," says Lou Nanni, vice president for university relations at the Indiana institution.…

Due to the decrease in public funding, community colleges are in a position where they need to generate private gifts. Alumni represent the largest untapped pool of prospective donors, and the success of alumni giving at 4-year institutions illustrates the potential that exists for community colleges. To develop effective fundraising strategies,…

"Commerce" and "finance" are not the broadest or most dynamic words in the lexicon of business. And yet, when this author became dean of the business school at Villanova University in 2005, that was precisely the language the school was using to advertise itself to the world. The Villanova College of Commerce & Finance, as…

It's common practice in higher education to conduct assessments--exams, state board tests, surveys, and focus groups, among other instruments. The resulting data are typically used to strengthen academic programs and improve outcomes. The same data sometimes also influence the strategic planning process. This article discusses how Pennsylvania's…

At the end of 2010, for the first time ever, smartphones outsold PCs. Mobile device adoption rates continue to rise rapidly around the world. A recent forecast by Cisco found that global mobile data traffic more than doubled last year, and by the end of 2012, the number of mobile devices in use will outnumber the world's population. In the United…

For the past couple of decades, customer relationship management has been quietly establishing itself as the way everybody does business. Migrating to the education community only in the past five years or so, it has acquired a more genteel transcription of its acronym: constituent relationship management. However one decodes the letters, CRM is…

Research suggests that institutional commitment to community engagement can be understood by examining levels of student, faculty, and community involvement in engagement; organizational structure, rewards, and campus publications supporting engagement; and compatibility of an institution's mission with this work (Holland, 1997). Underlying all of…