Penn ranked No. 7 in a list for institutional fundraising in the United States, beating out peer institutions Columbia University and Yale University.
The Council for Aid to Education released their report on the twenty institutions in the United States that raised the most money in the fiscal year 2017 on Feb. 6.
Penn raised $626 million in 2017, falling behind Harvard University and Cornell University. Penn has slowly been climbing the ranks. In the fiscal year of 2015, Penn stood at 10th place in the list at $520 million in donations. In 2016, Penn stood at 8th place.
Fundraising is an intrinsic part of how Penn runs as an institution. Penn employs over 500 people to work in 17 development offices on campus. Specific employees are designated to work as points of contact for wealthy alumni, who make up the largest sum of donations.
“[Our] strategy is to keep our alumni feeling connected, feeling like they’re a part of Penn and that Penn’s still a part of them,” Assistant Vice President for Alumni Relations Fredrick Hoopes Wampler told The Daily Pennsylvanian in 2015.
Penn President Amy Gutmann’s yearly compensation depends on a variety of factors “from fund raising to advancing innovation, class strength, improving student and faculty diversity, increasing financial aid, new capital projects, faculty recruitment, research priorities, and medical practice advances,” Penn Board of Trustees Chair David Cohen wrote in an email to The Daily Pennsylvanian.
Gutmann made over $3.5 million in 2015, making her the fourth-highest-paid university president in the country.
CAE detailed that, throughout all of the 20 institutions, alumni gifts increased by 14.5 percent in 2017, a large shift from the 8.5 percent decline of alumni donations in 2016.
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