Cases in which colleges and universities have taken a donor or his/her heir to court over promised donations, while rare, have been spotlighted recently. Ordinarily, institutions avoid such public battles through careful gift planning or quiet settlement of disputes. However, some feel such cases will multiply because donors and heirs are becoming…

Describes a fund raising project, the "palette of prizes," to raise money for theatre for children in Blair County, Pennsylvania. Discusses creation of theater presentations involving nearly the entire student body. Suggests 11 lessons for other communities interested in using Blair County's arts education programming as a model. Discusses…

Roberta Guaspari-Tzavoras teaches 125 young violinists in 2 East Harlem elementary schools. Students are chosen by lottery. The only prerequisite is a willingness to do the hard work of practicing and learning. Her success in coaching inner-city students to a performance in Carnegie hall is the subject of a documentary and a feature film. (MLF)

Figures published by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) indicate that colleges and universities are engaging in longer capital campaigns while relying on fewer donors. The report identifies 18 colleges that currently fail to comply with CASE standards. A chart summarizes results of fund-raising campaigns at 138 U.S.…

A donor-advised fund, increasingly popular for college giving, can be used by donors for immediate tax benefits and flexibility in charitable giving. The donor makes an irrevocable gift to the fund, which is considered a charitable organization, and the fund administrator invests the gift. The donor specifies the amount to be given and the…

Describes how Iowa State University's mishandling of a bequest of farmland (the land was sold despite a directive that it be maintained by the university) cut to the heart of both its own credibility and the region's source of pride. (EV)

Details survey of over 100 child care centers about successful and unsuccessful fundraising projects. Highlights ten key factors contributing to success: defining the purpose for fundraising, setting a goal, knowing the audience, making it fun, building on strengths, looking for repeated fundraisers, being cost effective, publicizing aggressively,…

Even in the best of times, librarians have to be concerned about funding. Librarians who are faced with reducing expenditures have to consider which of them are essential for the institution to fulfill its mission. With all the changes that today's information technologies have brought, the library's role both now and in the future is not as…

As tuition and state support become increasingly constrained, private fund raising is becoming an ever more important source of institutional revenue. Internal faculty and staff giving campaigns are a key part of fund-raising efforts. This study, carried out at a mid-sized, state-assisted, Midwestern university, provided critical information about…

Stewardship, defined in terms of shared beliefs, social structure, and organizational routines, was explored using a comparative case study approach to determine how conditions in the institutional and task environments and internal organizational characteristics influence the nature of the stewardship process in five professional schools at the…

California State University (CSU) system campuses, with few exceptions, have achieved lower alumni participation rates than peer institutions. This study determined the status of alumni giving at public comprehensive institutions, examined relevant indicators of performance from alumni fundraising, and examined institutional factors associated…

Financial difficulties have prompted institutions of higher education to explore private sources of funding. In recent years, public institutions have significantly increased their focus on private giving, with several campaigns having more than $1 billion as a goal. Family and consumer sciences (FCS) professionals need to be actively involved in…

Understanding the factors that influence alumni giving is a critical task of institutional marketers and development officers. To better understand the factors that influence alumni support, this research reports the results of a field experiment in which the effect that acknowledgement of alumni contributions has on their subsequent donation…

Having experienced three stages of "preliminary establishment", "rapid and comprehensive development" and "steady development" for twenty years, China's postdoctoral system is moving towards a new one, the stage of "quality improvement and innovation development." Remarkable achievements in the system…

The United States is home to about 1.3 million organizations that fall under the IRS's 501(c)(3) classification of "[tax]-exempt organizations," known informally as nonprofits. A nonprofit is defined as a formally incorporated nongovernmental organization that operates in the public interest, rather than in order to make a profit. Its income, in…