Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, September 15, 1993 TAG: 9309150365
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JIM STRATTON NEWPORT NEWS DAILY PRESS
DATELINE: WILLIAMSBURG LENGTH: Long
You may not know them or their college, but they know you and in time, they'll call . . . they'll call.
Over the past 20 years, college fund raising in Virginia has turned into a multimillion-dollar, high-tech business.
Fusing computer technology with legwork and charm, state-assisted colleges collected at least $110 million in 1991-92, according to the latest figures from a survey by the Council for Aid to Education in New York. Six of Virginia's 15 four-year public colleges did not participate.
Fund-raisers use an arsenal of sincerity, horse sense and detective work.
Staffers in development offices keep track of graduates' successes through alumni records. They comb newspaper clippings for the alumnus who's become CEO of Leviathan Industries Inc. or president of Megabucks and Associates. They scrutinize corporate reports, professional directories and trade papers for power brokers with connections to their schools. They sometimes use electronic screening of census data to locate pockets of wealth.
The profession has begun to resemble a science with its own laws, theorems and hypotheses.
A University of Pennsylvania fund-raiser has determined that once a few likely big givers have been identified, it takes 7.5 meetings or calls to get a donation: It takes 2.5 meetings before a prospect decides, yes or no. About one in three says yes. So, 2.5 times three equals 7.5.
Up to 80 percent of money raised in major campaigns comes from as few as 20 percent of the givers. "The idea," one official explained, "is to get as much money from as few people as possible."
The donor limits the money's use 70 percent to 80 percent of the time.
By the time officials unveil a major campaign goal, the school is likely to have at least 30 percent collected. When William and Mary went public with its drive to raise $150 million, it had more than $40 million in gifts and pledges.
Professional money raisers know the best information comes by word of mouth. They hold meetings around the country to ask alumni for names of potential big donors.
W&M officials, planning their seven-year, $150 million campaign, used those tactics to identify about 275 potential six-figure donors "we didn't even know existed," says a source familiar with the drive. Officials briefly toyed with raising their goal to $300 million in honor of the school's 300th anniversary.
"When you get a bunch of fund-raisers together," says one veteran administrator, "There is no shortage of rose-colored glasses."
The most crucial time in fund raising comes when officials and contributors finally get eyeball to eyeball. The officials explain their priorities, and donors describe their interests.
Says Dennis Slon, William and Mary's director of development, "If you can't get a donor interested in a particular project, they're not going to make the commitment. I don't care how much money they have."
Once the donor's interested, fund-raisers have to know how to pop the question. The president may be called in. If all goes right, a press release announcing a big gift goes out. Or maybe not.
When six schools were asked to provide lists of their largest donors for these stories, one refused to release specifics, and three pleaded for discretion in the use of their responses. Virginia Commonwealth University Vice President Peter L. Wyeth wrote: "We are concerned that identifying individual donors and the specific amounts of their gifts could jeopardize future giving."
Shielding contributors from public scrutiny is part of maintaining pleasant and profitable relationships - fund raising as friend raising.
"You can get all the lists and information in the world," says Harry Creemers, vice president for development at Old Dominion University, "but you've got to know the donors."
\ VIRGINIA COLLEGE DONATIONS\ A SAMPLING\ (Because some schools do not report gifts to their private foundations, there's no way to tell if these are the largest.)\ \ Virginia Tech\ \ $2.98 million from the R.B. Pamplin Corp. to support the R.B. Pamplin College of Business, the Corps of Cadets, athletic programs and a YMCA at the school. \ $1.53 million from R.B. Pamplin, a Portland, Ore., businessman, and his family to support the R.B. Pamplin College of Business.\ \ The College of William and Mary\ \ $650,000 from Wendy Reves, a former fashion model and widow of author and financier Emery Reves, for support of the school's international studies program. Five-hundred thousand of this gift was a partial payment on a $3 million commitment.\ \ $500,000 from Mark McCormack, an international sports agent from Orlando, Fla., for construction of a new tennis center. The gift was a partial payment for an earlier $3 million commitment.\ \ Old Dominion University $6 million in computer equipment from IBM.\ \ $400,000 from George Dragas Jr. and Marcus G. Dragas, executives of The Dragas Companies, to turn a former print-shop building into a new home for the international programs and international student/faculty services offices.\ \ "Multimillion-dollar gift," exact amount not disclosed, from Norfolk composer F. Ludwig Diehn, to finance an addition to the Fine and Performing Arts Center, endow a new professorship in music and finance the President's Concert series.\ \ The University of Virginia\ \ $6.7 million from David A. Harrison III, a retired investment banker from Hopewell, for the School of Law, the School of Medicine, a professorship in archaeology and the department of athletics.\ \ $1.95 million from the Beirne B. Carter, a Salem businessman, for the Beirne B. Carter Endowment for Immunology.\ - Jim Stratton
by CNB