Volume 28 · Number 2 · Winter 2011
The Campaign for UC Davis
The orchestra performs at the campaign launch
What people are saying
“As both an alumnus and a business leader, I am excited to take part in this defining moment for UC Davis. I ask everyone who is a part of the UC Davis family to support this campaign.”
“The continuous support allows vague ideas to come to fruition over time, and more developed, ongoing ideas to be propelled forward in an accelerated way.”
“UC Davis is the No. 1 engine for economic and cultural development in the region. The more support we give to the university, the more we’re investing in the future of our region.”
“This support has enabled and inspired me to pursue my dream.”
“UC Davis has always been willing to move out ahead and lead the way. The campaign will create a whole new level of visibility for the campus, which in turn will create additional opportunity. It is just another example of the university’s spirit of leadership, innovation and entrepreneurship.”
“This one gift allowed me to do some very big things. Philanthropy can make a tremendous difference in the lives of students here at UC Davis.”
“It was this scholarship, at this time, that propelled me forward.”
Gifts that support our vision
Improving the world through philanthropy
UC Davis joins an elite group of the nation’s Universities in setting a $1 billion fundraising goal With the Campaign for UC Davis.
Students were the first to be asked to take to their feet. They were followed by faculty, then staff; and next by alumni, donors, volunteers and other friends of the university. Within moments, the entire crowd inside the Robert and Margrit Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts was standing — a diverse group of UC Davis supporters who had turned out on the morning of Oct. 22 to witness history in the making. The occasion? The public launch of The Campaign for UC Davis — the university’s first-ever comprehensive effort to raise $1 billion in private support from 100,000 donors to help fulfill the university’s mission and vision.
“We do have heart at UC Davis. And we have drive. So now it is time for action,” Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi told the hundreds in attendance at the ceremony. “I am kicking off The Campaign for UC Davis with a call to action. Our foundation is strong. Our vision is bold.
And our potential is great.”
In publicly embarking on a $1 billion campaign, UC Davis joins a select group of universities; only about 1 percent of the nation’s four-year colleges and universities are currently in campaigns of at least $1 billion.
John Lippincott, president of the Council for Advancement and Support of Education, a Washington, D.C.-based international association of educational institutions, knows the meaning of a campaign of this magnitude.
“About 75 of the more than 2,500 four-year institutions in the United States have launched campaigns of a billion dollars or more,” Lippincott says, “putting UC Davis in good company. But it’s not about the company you keep or about the financial goal, but about fulfilling the mission of the institution to educate students and benefit the greater good. Private gifts to education, regardless of the amount, are an investment in the future.”
A landmark occasion
The campaign is the latest milestone in the history of UC Davis, a university that was born with the help of visionary philanthropy. In 1906, George Pierce Jr. — a prominent local farmer and the Central Valley’s first UC alum — persuaded the Davisville Chamber of Commerce to contribute $4,517, or about $100,000 in today’s dollars, to secure the water rights necessary to build the campus. Ever since, the generosity of thousands of donors has greatly leveraged the funding the university receives from the state, strengthening the university’s capacity to be a global leader for positive change.
At several key moments in its history, the university has launched initiatives to raise funds for important causes — such as the Memorial Union; a new recreation hall — now part of the Activities and Recreation Center; the Students First campaign — an effort to increase scholarship support; and the Center for the Arts Campaign, which helped build the Robert and Margrit Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts.
But The Campaign for UC Davis is unprecedented. It is the first time the entire university — all colleges, schools, programs, disciplines and locations — is participating in a unified, coordinated effort to meet universitywide fundraising goals in order to achieve a universitywide vision.
The campaign’s goals will support UC Davis: A Vision of Excellence — a strategic framework completed earlier this year under Katehi’s leadership, with broad campus and community input. The Campaign for UC Davis is considered a comprehensive campaign because it encompasses the entire university, and because all private gifts to the university are counted in the campaign total. Through the campaign, the university seeks to raise funds for student financial support, in conjunction with the UC-wide Project You Can initiative; endowed chairs and professorships; instruction, scholarship, research and patient care; program support; the university environment; and emerging opportunities across the university.
The campaign “will be a stretch for UC Davis,” said Kevin Bacon ’72, chair of the UC Davis Foundation Board of Trustees. “I know this campaign won’t be easy, but I think it will be incredibly gratifying to all involved because it will enable the university to accomplish even greater things in service to society.”
Impacts of Philanthropy
With Katehi’s call to action this past October, the campaign entered its public phase, which is expected to last through 2014. Over the next four years, the university aims to raise its profile as it attracts donors from around the world to step forward with gifts of all sizes. So far, more than 73,000 friends and supporters have pledged more than $612 million in contributions as part of the campaign. These private donations are already making remarkable impacts on the world and helping the university to advance excellence, opportunity, innovation, public service and quality of life.
Campaign fundraising began in July 2006, with a quiet phase — a practice common among multiyear fundraising campaigns.
One transformative contribution that came during the quiet phase was the $100 million commitment from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation to create the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing. The philanthropic commitment — the largest in the nation in support of nursing education, and the largest contribution ever made to UC Davis — is helping the school improve health care through an interdisciplinary approach to nursing education and research. The school welcomed its inaugural class of graduate students in September.
Other private gifts have helped the university make significant improvements to teaching and research facilities. The School of Veterinary Medicine, for example, has expanded and upgraded its teaching, research and patient care facilities with the help of substantial gifts from the Wayne and Gladys Valley Foundation and other donors. And the Graduate School of Management now has a new home in the environmentally friendly Maurice J. Gallagher, Jr. Hall, thanks to the support of donors like Maurice Gallagher ’71, and his wife, Marcia, who gave $10 million to the school for the building project and endowment support.
“There isn’t a better philanthropic investment I could have made than supporting UC Davis,” Gallagher said. “We alumni, and the UC Davis community, have to invest in our heritage to maintain and to grow the impact of this world-class institution. By definition, investment is future.”
Gallagher and longtime UC Davis supporter Margrit Mondavi are the campaign’s honorary co-chairs and members of the Campaign Cabinet. They are working in concert with volunteer and university leaders to build on the campaign’s success so far.
“I know of the many contributions UC Davis is making in California and across the globe,” Mondavi explained. “Through arts and cultural programs and teaching and research in viticulture and enology, UC Davis is advancing the art of winemaking, is enriching lives and adding joie de vivre. I am proud to be part of this historic campaign.”
Dedicated supporters of UC Davis, Margrit and her late husband, Robert Mondavi, helped create the world-class Robert and Margrit Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts, and the Robert Mondavi Institute for Wine and Food Science, a sustainable, cutting-edge teaching and research facility. More recently, Margrit Mondavi stepped forward with leadership support for a new museum of art at UC Davis with a $2 million pledge.
Campaign gifts are also helping promising students attend UC Davis. One gift can touch many people. For instance, one scholarship fund established in 2007 with a gift of $125,000 from Reno Cruz ’74, the Reno and Margaret Cruz Scholarship, has already benefitted 33 students with financial need who have demonstrated leadership qualities.
Hank Davis, a sophomore, knows first-hand the value of scholarships. Davis was the valedictorian of his high school in Martinez, but he worried about the financial strain of attending a four-year institution. The biomedical engineering major has received the Julie Bryant Memorial Scholarship and the John Eric Peckham Memorial Scholarship, awards that have helped him focus on his studies and expand his knowledge through summer session classes.
“My scholarships really made a difference in my education,” Davis explained. “I’m so thankful for all the UC Davis supporters who help students like me reach their full potential.”
And the work of esteemed UC Davis faculty like economics professor Robert Feenstra is aided by many kinds of private gifts, including those to establish endowed chairs.
“Whatever area donors decide to support with their philanthropy, it will make a big difference,” Feenstra said. “Even one gift makes a difference, not just to the individual who benefits but to the entire department and university as a whole.”
Feenstra holds the C. Bryan Cameron Distinguished Chair in International Economics, which was established through a $1 million gift from Bryan Cameron ’80. The endowed chair has allowed Feenstra to involve more graduate and undergraduate students in his research comparing per capita income over time and between countries — and also to pursue a broader range of research topics.
Professor Bob Powell, chair of the UC Davis Academic Senate, notes an additional benefit that comes from endowed chairs: “One thing that sets UC Davis faculty apart is their reputation for engaging in interdisciplinary research. Endowed chairs provide funds for outstanding faculty to undertake novel research, research that has an element of risk to it — in the sense of not being within the bounds of what is typically done in the discipline.
“If you can provide resources for faculty to engage in that kind of innovative research,” said Powell, professor and chair of the Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, “you really expand the reputation that UC Davis already has for being on the cutting edge of the advancement of knowledge and discovery.”
Gifts to the UC Davis Annual Fund are also vital contributions and count toward the campaign’s goals. Contributions to the Annual Fund provide flexible funding that allows the university to seize emerging opportunities, and support critical purposes including student scholarships and faculty awards. Each year, thousands of donors make gifts of all sizes to UC Davis through the Annual Fund. During the campaign, the university will seek to engage many more Annual Fund donors than ever before.
“The Campaign for UC Davis is ambitious — it is one of the largest university campaigns in the nation. It challenges us all, calls us to action. We have a great deal of work ahead of us to meet our goals. But we have a great cause, and we are very optimistic,” said Associate Vice Chancellor for University Development Cheryl Brown Lohsé.
“Our alumni, parents, friends and other supporters recognize the valuable contributions that UC Davis is making in the lives of people in the region and across the world,” said Lohsé. “With everyone’s help, we will succeed. We are deeply grateful and honored by each donor’s philanthropic investment in the work done here at the university.”
A Second Century of Excellence
Optimism and Aggie Pride were in the air at the Mondavi Center on Oct. 22 as the hundreds of students and staff, faculty and alumni, donors and volunteers gathered for the campaign’s public kickoff and the celebration of the advances already taking place with the help of campaign gifts. Despite the turbulent economy and a world beset by challenges from food security to clean energy solutions to education reform, UC Davis’ supporters spoke with great confidence about the university’s capacity to teach, discover and serve to improve the world, in keeping with UC Davis’ land-grant mission to identify and meet society’s challenges.
In a speech at the campaign kickoff, Peter Blando ’93 M.B.A. ’02, chair of the UC Davis Staff Assembly, was one of many who endorsed the campaign and expressed confidence in its ability to expand UC Davis’ impact on the world during the university’s second century.
“What we have assembled here today is hope,” Blando said. “Hope and optimism about UC Davis’ future.”
Learn more about the campaign…