Endowment Info

[reeder]

From the Siena board - MAAC endowments:

Fairfield U. (1942) $141.9 Million

Loyola U. (1852) $118.9

Siena College(1937) $104.6

Rider U. (1865) $ 49.8

Canisius C. (1870) $ 48.6

Niagara U. (1856) $ 38.0

Manhattan C. (1853) $ 27.4

St. Peters C.(1872) $ 20.0

Marist C. (1929) $ 17.5

Iona C. (1940 $ 17.2

 

 

Not sure of the AE and don't have the time to research, but the UA has published the following endowments for what it considers it's peer group:

Florida State - 325M

Binghamton - 36

Santa Cruz - 69

UConn - 103

Delaware - 864

UMass-Amherst - 71

Buffalo - 388

Stony Brook - 40

Santa Barbara - 81

Kansas - 586

Nebraska - 577

Oregon - 228

 

Albany - 16

 

To me, this shows the commitment that the University has to athletics. The fact that the endowment dollars are so low and they are committed to building new athletic facilities.

 

For those of you who don't give to UA, write a check - this is pretty bad

Edited June 14, 2005 by reeder

[DaneMan]

Not to be the dark cloud again, but someone in the UA office needs to get a reality check. Who thought it was a good idea to put FSU, Oregon, Kansas, Nebraska and UConn on that list has to be a complete idiot. 3 of those five have established DI football programs with BCS Bowls under their belt. The other two are building up their football programs, but are national powers in hoops. Last time I checked Albany was nowhere near being in that same group.

[reeder]

Not to be the dark cloud again, but someone in the UA office needs to get a reality check. Who thought it was a good idea to put FSU, Oregon, Kansas, Nebraska and UConn on that list has to be a complete idiot. 3 of those five have established DI football programs with BCS Bowls under their belt. The other two are building up their football programs, but are national powers in hoops. Last time I checked Albany was nowhere near being in that same group.

 

I don't disagree, but even if you take those schools out and look at the other SUNY schools - the closest to UA is Binghamton that has more than twice Albany's endowment.

[DaneMan]

I completely agree that it's pathetic, but you compound the fact when you compare it to those other schools. Delaware is on our level basically in everything but football and they are kicking our ass.

 

Do you have a link to the orginal endowment release?

[UAalum72]

The way I heard it, when the State University system was created in NY, the private colleges didn't want competition for donations from the publics, so the legislature was supposed to pick up the tab every year, and there was no need or tradition of giving. (never mind that ever since the privates have been complaining about how much public money is spent on the state colleges)

 

Buffalo and for a short time Bing were private colleges. Stony Brook I suppose has the hospital/medical complex, while Albany's older alumni to a large extent are still those super-wealthy former high school teachers.

 

The whole issue of the endowment is something that has to be addressed for the entire univerisity's fiscal health, not just athletics.

[GODANESGO]

Not to be the dark cloud again, but someone in the UA office needs to get a reality check.  Who thought it was a good idea to put FSU, Oregon, Kansas, Nebraska and UConn on that list has to be a complete idiot.  3 of those five have established DI football programs with BCS Bowls under their belt. The other two are building up their football programs, but are national powers in hoops.  Last time I checked Albany was nowhere near being in that same group.

While it is true that many of these schools have more successful and prominent athletic programs, endowment numbers (and therefore these comparisons) are not simply a symbol of athletics. While I agree most of these schools aren't currently in our "peer" group in a number of categories as of yet, like parents and teachers always say...set the bar high.

 

For what it's worth, the first time I met with President Hall he actually said this figure was one of the biggest, if not THE biggest, problems we have here at UAlbany. Adding it is a top priority of his to increase this number. He actually visted the UAlbany Fund center (the group of people who call all alumni and parents of students looking for money for our school..lol) one night praising the students working there and encouraging them to do even more, showing how much this fund helps our school.

 

As a side note, I'm surprised some of these schools (especially UMass and UConn) are as low as they are, especially compared to some of the other schools that I would consider "lesser" name schools (while I realize that's very personal-opinion based) like UDelaware.

[reeder]

Daneman,

I wasn't doing the comparing - just reporting what UA published. Maybe the comparison group is wrong but the numbers are bad. Link Below

 

Dashboard info

[Dane96]

Not to be the dark cloud again, but someone in the UA office needs to get a reality check.  Who thought it was a good idea to put FSU, Oregon, Kansas, Nebraska and UConn on that list has to be a complete idiot.  3 of those five have established DI football programs with BCS Bowls under their belt. The other two are building up their football programs, but are national powers in hoops.  Last time I checked Albany was nowhere near being in that same group.

While it is true that many of these schools have more successful and prominent athletic programs, endowment numbers (and therefore these comparisons) are not simply a symbol of athletics. While I agree most of these schools aren't currently in our "peer" group in a number of categories as of yet, like parents and teachers always say...set the bar high.

 

For what it's worth, the first time I met with President Hall he actually said this figure was one of the biggest, if not THE biggest, problems we have here at UAlbany. Adding it is a top priority of his to increase this number. He actually visted the UAlbany Fund center (the group of people who call all alumni and parents of students looking for money for our school..lol) one night praising the students working there and encouraging them to do even more, showing how much this fund helps our school.

 

As a side note, I'm surprised some of these schools (especially UMass and UConn) are as low as they are, especially compared to some of the other schools that I would consider "lesser" name schools (while I realize that's very personal-opinion based) like UDelaware.

Endowment ABSOLUTELY is a reflection on athletics. The best schools have ENDOWED scholarship funds, making the academic/athletic dynamic that much easier for Professors to swallow.

 

Great example...William and Mary just officially had all their scholarships endowed for football. No suprise a few years later they jumped to the top of the A-Ten after a few lean years.

[alum73]

Endowments and Athletic Programs aren't synonymous. The ivys have some of the largest endowments, but aren't building powerhouse D1 programs in most sports. Obviously if we had more money we could spend it and the university is aggressively working on fund raising, but this has only been for a short time. I do contribute money every year, but I'm waiting for a contract extension for Brown before I donate again. It won't be enough to build the stadium, regardless. I keep buying those lottery and mega millions tickets though.

[GODANESGO]

Endowments and Athletic Programs aren't synonymous.

Thank you alum73, that's more what I was attempting to say. I do agree that it more often than not reflects on athletics, but they're not one in the same. We can always count on Dane96 to catch any slight shaky-ness in wording.

[Dane96]

Oh good lord...ENDOWMENTS PAY FOR SCHOLARSHIP FUNDS AT MAJOR UNIVERSITIES...PERIOD.

 

Second, the IVY's support A) more expansive array's of sports compared to non-Ivy's, generally, outside of the Yale-Harvard game, do not have huge gate receipts to fund the large amount of programs C) Have more expensive sports to fun, such as CREW (at 90k a boat). The Ivy's success is notable in many Olympic sports. Further, can you say Ivy basketball doesnt enjoy succes? The argument makes no sense. Ivy's, to be honest, aren't really trying to win it all. Trust me...if they wanted to forgo academic standards (i.e. get on par with Vandy, NW, Stanford with admissions), Harvard, Yale, and Princeton could become athletic powers in all sports within a short few years. If Harvard went DI football...kids that normally go to Stanford, Vandy, etc. would clamor to play at the BEST ACADEMIC SCHOOL IN THE LAND.

 

 

Furthermore, NONE of these schools give athletic aid. We know that is bull$iena on paper, however in the financial aid office it is not. The students get merit or NEED based money and the funding of scholarships THUS comes from endowed funds.

 

GDG...I learned all of this in very intensive interviews with the Princeton athletic department for a position they had open and again when I worked with StudentAdvantage/FansOnly (now CSTV affiliate).

 

SO...the argument is off base.

 

If you look at athletcs and endowments at major DI universities...there is a correllation (sp?)

 

 

And i am not nitpicking...just you guys are COMPLETELY off base. It isn't often I agree with Daneman or D2k, however after our year long battle last year, I can say this....based on what I know of these two guys...they are definately spot on regarding their knowledge of funding athletics.

 

GDG...you scoff at my picking at you...yet I offered you WM and now the Ivy argument. Provide me some info to the contrary. Until that point in time.....

Edited June 14, 2005 by Dane96

[GODANESGO]

Haha, no worries D96..I'm not scoffing. I really think it's good to have members read as closely as you do. It challenges everyone who posts to more clearly state their comments.

 

I agree with everything you posted and my original post wasn't to say there is no (or even just little) correlation between athletics and endowments. I happen to believe, from your examples and the number of others, that there's a major correlation between the two. I was just pointing out, like I believe alum73 and UAalum72 were as well, that endowmwnts are not just for university athletic programs, but for a number of aspects of a university's financial health and well-being.

[alum73]

96 take it easy. You and GDG are resembling Siena posters. Of course, the more revenue you have the more you can spend on sports, and while the percentage has drastically shrunk, a good portion of UA's budget is provided by the state, which the privates don't get. Our endowment is small and will hopefully will grow, but I think the point was many schools with large endowmnets don't spend them on athletics, while others do. If you go through the list, many are not spending huge sums on athletics. I don't think either GDG or myself is saying they're totally unrelated. You can't spend what you don't have.

[Dane96]

I agree with your last comments, the two of you. I just thought you were referring to athletics only.

[DaneMan]

One other thing that was pointed out to me from that report was Albany's graduation rate among athletes was the second worst, just behind Riverside. That is also pathetic considering FSU, Nebraska, Oregon and some of the others have kids leave early all the time to play professionally, whereas the Albany student-athletes are basically there for four years no matter what.