Deceiving Harvard’s Donors

Flipping through the annual report of the Harvard College Fund (HCF), it is hard not to notice the number of photos of smiling undergraduates presumably made happy by the generosity of donors to the Fund. They leap out at any reader and are enough to make even a minor donor feel good about writing their check. In actuality, however, their donation to the Fund may never make its way back to undergraduate life—a deception that must be corrected.

The push for alumni to give back to Harvard through the HCF begins before seniors graduate, and the solicitations only increase in frequency and intensity as the years pass. They are usually quite successful; the money gained from the generosity of Harvard alumni—around $80 million per year to the HCF alone—is the fuel that the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) requires to keep running.

The pressure to keep this money flowing may well contribute to the misleading of donors to the Harvard College Fund. In fact, even the Fund’s name is misleading. Though several donors that The Crimson spoke to believed that their gifts to the HCF were going directly to benefit the College, in reality the dean of the Faculty ultimately controls everything given to the HCF. And while the Development Office does not hide this fact, neither does it promote it.

Furthermore, the Development Office makes a concerted effort to encourage unrestricted donations, gifts that can be used for any expense. In an official brochure promoting the Harvard College Fund, former FAS dean William C. Kirby goes so far to call unrestricted donations “the lifeblood of the College.” Unrestricted gifts, the brochure claims, will go to expanding the freshman seminar program, providing money for senior arts projects, and supporting financial aid.

But in reality such gifts, which comprise up to 90 percent of the donations to the HCF, more often go to decidedly less sexy causes—including maintenance costs and utility bills that the entire FAS incurs. While many of these expenditures benefit the College indirectly, they do not accomplish the goal that the fund’s name would seem to imply and many donors seem to expect: to give back to undergraduate life at Harvard College.

It is difficult, on the other hand, for a donor, especially one without vast sums to give, to restrict his or her gift to benefit undergraduates, especially if he or she wants class credit for it. Gifts that receive class credit are publicly recognized and added to the total given by members of their class, which is prominently displayed in the annual report and announced the afternoon of commencement. Nevertheless, only five options within the Harvard College Fund have traditionally counted for class credit: unrestricted, financial aid, libraries, faculty support, and graduate fellowships. Only recently has an “undergraduate life fund” option been added. And even now, it only appears on the online form for “credit card gifts,” not for check, stock, or mutual fund gifts. On some Development Office mailings, the option is missing entirely.

The “undergraduate life fund,” which is a sub-fund of the HCF, went into effect in 2005 and was created by Dean of the College Benedict H. Gross ’71, former Deputy Dean of the College Patricia O’Brien, and FAS Dean for Development Scott A. Abell ’72 (though in an interview Gross denied O’Brien’s participation), according to Abell and several other sources who requested anonymity to preserve ongoing relationships with current administrators. Also known as the Dean’s Discretionary Fund for Undergraduate Life, the fund has been responsible for bankrolling several important student life projects such as the renovations of Hilles Library into student group space, the renovation of freshman common rooms in Yard basements, the Lamont Café, the Cambridge Queen’s Head Pub, and events sponsored by the College Events Board.

Nevertheless, according to Abell, it is entirely possible for the FAS dean to decide to spend the money on projects unrelated to undergraduate life, despite the donor’s intent and the Development Office’s advertisements.

Unlike many universities, the dean of the College reports to the FAS dean, not the University president. Consequently, all College spending must have the approval of the FAS dean, who plays a significant role in setting the priorities for College spending.

This arrangement means that all of the money in the Harvard College Fund is spent at the discretion of the dean of FAS. This includes donations to the fund for undergraduate life, despite official language that the money is spent by the dean of the College “in consultation” with the FAS dean.

Gross told The Crimson in an interview that “I’ve been very happy with what I’ve been able to fund this year.” Yet current and former administrators say that it has been historically difficult to secure funds—including those in the undergraduate life fund—for projects that will benefit undergraduate life.

Unbeknownst to most donors, one can donate to a College project or organization, such as House committees, according to both Abell and Gross. Yet since these gifts do not count towards class credit, few know they are an option, and they are not as common an occurrence as they would be if they were better publicized.

To correct these problems, Harvard must make changes in the way that donations are solicited for the HCF and the way that HCF money is controlled and spent.

First, the University must stop pulling a bait-and-switch on donors who wish to give to initiatives that will directly benefit undergraduate life. It is not acceptable to tempt donors with the promise of improving the undergraduate experience and then use their generosity to finance unrelated activities. In the future, the Harvard College Fund should do a better job of advertising itself for what it is—an fund to be spent at the discretion of the FAS dean on FAS-wide initiatives. If the HCF continues to be administered by FAS dean and used for such purposes, it ought to be renamed.

Second, the Dean’s Discretionary Fund for Undergraduate Life must be better publicized, and the dean of the College should be solely responsible for allocating money given to it, without FAS oversight. Given the large role played by FAS in the budgetary process, it remains questionable how much latitude the College has to set its own priorities and fund its own programs.

Furthermore, even fewer potential donors are aware that they can give directly to a House committee or other campus organization without going through the Harvard College Fund. Though unrestricted giving to the University is important, gifts to these organizations, without which some cannot survive, should also be given class credit.

With the ascension of McKay Professor of Computer Science Michael D. Smith to the FAS deanship, we hope that a higher priority will be placed on the improvement of undergraduate life. While Smith will have to deal with a budget deficit and a slew of different priorities, we are hopeful that undergraduate life will not be neglected in budgeting and fundraising during his tenure.