Photo by Phoebe Sheehan/for VTDigger
Officials with the UVM Foundation, an affiliated fundraising nonprofit, say the “Move Mountains” campaign, as the school has dubbed it, will equal a similar campaign at the private Middlebury College for the largest fundraising effort in Vermont’s history — and the largest ever for a public institution in the state.
Friday ended the so-called “silent phase” of the campaign, which has been in the works since 2011, school officials said. During that time the university has collected $248 million toward its $500 million goal. It plans to raise the remaining quarter-billion dollars by 2019. It received $40 million in the past two days, officials said.
The $20 million gift came from Steven Grossman, class of ‘61, the former CEO of Southern Container Corp., and the Steven Grossman Family Foundation. It will go toward the university’s Business School, which will be renamed the Grossman School of Business. Grossman is also a member of the UVM Foundation board.
“We are no longer going to be so quiet about our accomplishments,” UVM President Tom Sullivan said to an ebullient crowd of students, faculty staff and trustees at the Davis Center’s Olin Atrium on Friday.
The campaign is meant to propel UVM to be among the “finest public research institutions” in the United States, Sullivan said, and ensure that the university remains “the economic engine of the state,” calling the campaign an investment in Vermont’s future.
The $500 million will go toward increasing endowed professorships, creating more scholarships for students and several capital projects, including the STEM Complex now under construction, the Alumni House on Summit Street and the UVM Medical Center’s planned inpatient facility on the hospital’s adjacent property.
University officials emphasized that the campaign is about people — the students staff and faculty that will benefit from scholarships, endowed teaching positions and new facilities. John Hilton, chair of the UVM Foundation board said the campaign comes down to one word: excellence. “And excellence isn’t cheap,” he added.
Though it was not hyped in any speeches or media materials released as part of the announcement, Sullivan told VTDigger after his remarks that some of the campaign money will go toward a new hockey and basketball arena that will double as a student recreation center and “cultural” event space to be located in the same area as Gutterson Fieldhouse and Patrick Gymnasium. He did not have a cost or timeframe for that project, saying it would be built “as soon as we have those commitments.”
Of the total fundraising campaign, $30 million is slated for the affiliated UVM Medical Center’s $187 million inpatient facility that recently received conditional approval from state regulators. John Brumsted, the hospital’s CEO, had already announced $12 million in donations, which were raised in conjunction with the university’s fundraising push.
The type of fundraising push that the foundation is spearheading is typical of large universities around the country — as is the formation of an affiliated nonprofit to raise that money. He pointed to recent campaigns and Boston University and the University of Southern California, which sought to raise $1.5 billion and $6 billion, respectively.
Bundy said that UVM is in direct competition with institutions like Boston University for bright students from across the Northeast and the nation. Increasing its scholarship offerings is one way the UVM can ensure it is able to attract top students.
At the same time, UVM is competing globally for academics, increasing its need to offer endowed professorships, which will give them job security and make working for the university more attractive, Bundy said. UVM has been increasing the number of endowed faculty positions over the past four years, he said, from 52 in 2011 when the fundraising campaign began to the current 97 positions.
Fundraising is crucial because state support for the Vermont State College system and UVM has stagnated (at between $40 and 42.5 million annually over the past five years) and to realize its ambitions for growth UVM can’t rely on a cash-strapped state government to increase its support, school officials said.
Rep. Bill Botzow, D-Bennington, a UVM trustee who was in attendance Friday, said the state will continue to partner with the university to help it realize its goals, but acknowledged that the state budget is “stretched,” and said the school is “lucky” to have such a high level of private support.
Correction: Steven Grossman’s job title was incorrect in an earlier version of this story. The amount sought in fundraising campaigns by other universities was also misstated in an earlier version of this story.
