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A $1 billion fund-raising campaign that planners say will position Carolina among the nation's elite universities in the next century already is well under way.
How big is a billion? It's a stack of $1 bills 30 miles high and the number of seconds in 30 years. It's the attendance at 16,000 games in Kenan Stadium. It's almost $1.2 million for every game won by Dean Smith.
And $1 billion is the preliminary target for Carolina's upcoming seven-year campaign. The campaign, which already is in the planning stages but will officially begin July 1, will transform Carolina by funding the highest priorities of departments and programs, adding professorships and scholarships and constructing new buildings and updating old ones.
"We really cannot imagine the full impact of this campaign," said Vice Chancellor for University Advancement Matt Kupec, the campaign's director. "A billion dollars or more, strategically directed at Carolina's top priorities, will make Chapel Hill a better place to learn and teach, expand our service to the state and greatly extend the generous investment made in us by the taxpayers of North Carolina."
"Few of us appreciate the magnitude of the funds to be raised and the transforming nature that this new level of private support will have on our campus," said Provost Richard J. Richardson. "We will literally make history here in the next seven years."
Chancellor Michael Hooker began talking about the need for a campaign soon after he took office in July 1995, at the end of the Bicentennial Campaign for Carolina. That six-year drive began with a goal of $320 million, which was later raised to $400 million. In the end the Bicentennial Campaign brought in $440 million. The impact of that first University-wide fund-raising campaign was substantial: $72 million for faculty support (including 60 professorships), $52 million for student support and $67 million for new buildings and renovations. The campaign received 68 gifts of $1 million or more. University faculty and staff contributed $9.9 million.
Fund raising didn't stop with the end of the Bicentennial Campaign. In fact, Carolina has exceeded its previous annual fund-raising total every year since the campaign ended. Fiscal 1998 was the seventh straight record-setting year for fund raising and the second year in which gifts and private grants topped the $100 million mark, placing Carolina in the elite company of about 25 U.S. universities that have reached this benchmark in private giving. Of the $131.8 million raised in 1998, $117.3 million (89 percent) was directed to academics and $14.5 million (11 percent) was directed to athletics.
Kupec said the campaign arises from these imperatives: the University has critical needs; the academic environment is changing, particularly through the use of expensive new information technology; and the campus's academic leaders have a bold vision for the University's future.
"A global revolution in knowledge and communications is under way, from the mapping of the human genome to instant worldwide communication links," Chancellor Hooker said. "Carolina should be among the leaders of this revolution, but we can only do so by anticipating change and securing the resources we need to capitalize on the many opportunities to come. The campaign will give us the means to choose the future we want."
Achieving that vision will cost money. And while Carolina raises more money every year, competing campuses are increasing their fund raising as well. Carolina must aim high to remain competitive in attracting and retaining the best faculty and students and in building outstanding departments and programs.
The campaign comes at a unique time. The nation is in the midst of a tremendous transfer of wealth between generations, estimated at $10.4 trillion over the next 25 years. Approximately $4 trillion of new wealth has been created in the stock market since 1995 and little has been given away.
The Office of University Development began laying the groundwork for the campaign early last year. Campaign planning went into high gear in December when the provost asked vice chancellors, deans and program directors reporting to him to submit their campaign priority lists.
"This priority-setting phase, which is similar to the priority-setting process that preceded the Bicentennial Campaign, ensures that every unit develops a list of its top academic needs and opportunities and that every unit is able to participate in setting campaign priorities," said Margie Crowell, associate vice chancellor for development.
Unit priorities -- listed in the categories of faculty/staff, students, programs, information resources, facilities and other -- will be sent to the provost by Jan. 29.
The provost and a case statement committee, comprised of the co-chairs of six task forces, will review these lists and by Feb. 19 refer items from them to the task forces:
Each task force is co-chaired by faculty from academic affairs and health affairs and has faculty from both areas as well as a liaison from the development office. Using guidelines developed by the University Planning and Budget Committee (UPBC) and approved by Chancellor Hooker, the task forces will recommend the items that should become campaign priorities. Recommendations are due to the case statement committee April 16. This committee, chaired by the provost, will integrate and edit the work of the task forces into a single document.
By May 14 this document will be sent to the council of deans, the UPBC, the executive council of the Faculty Council, the executive council of the Employee Forum and the chancellor's cabinet for review.
These groups will report to the chancellor by June 18. The chancellor will make the final determination of campaign priorities and send his recommendations to the campaign steering committee, a volunteer alumni group which will lead the campaign. Volunteers and donors will review the draft and suggest revisions or changes.
The final case statement, due in September 2001, will outline Carolina's campaign goals and objectives and drive fund raising for the campaign.
Meanwhile, all gifts to the University made on or after July 1 will count in the campaign total. This is based on conventional fund-raising wisdom that dictates a quiet phase of approximately two years while a campus finalizes goals and solicits major campaign gifts, leading up to a public kickoff and the revelation that a good chunk of campaign gifts already has been received, inspiring other donors to contribute.
With this campaign the University has bucked the tradition. "The fact that Carolina needs to embark on a $1 billion campaign has been discussed in public forums and in the press since Chancellor Hooker's arrival," Kupec said. "We have to launch a campaign of this size, and succeed, for us to reach our goal of becoming the top public university in the country."
The only suspense, then, at the kickoff in 2001 will be the announcement of the campaign name, goal and gifts in hand. The lowest goal mentioned to date is $1 billion. Occasionally University leaders mention a goal as high as $1.5 billion. Testing the draft case statements with key volunteers and donors will help the development office set the goal.
The development office will coordinate the campaign, assist academic and other units in fund raising and receive gifts. Twenty fund-raisers in the office work with alumni and friends of the University through areas such as the annual fund, corporations and foundations, the phonathon, planned giving and special campaigns. Seven regional development officers cover the United States. The office also has staff engaged in research, donor stewardship, gift accounting and communications for the benefit of all fund-raising units in the University.
Fifty-one development officers are employed by University units ranging from the Ackland Musuem of Art to WUNC radio, although not all are full-time fund raisers.
These 71 individuals, working together and with volunteers, their deans and directors, trustees and the chancellor, are charged with securing private gifts for the University.
How will a handful of people raise $1 billion? They will be armed with a powerful case for support and a list of dynamic and innovative programs which private gifts can create or assist at Carolina. They also will get a little help from their friends -- alumni volunteers who encourage others to give. "So many Carolina alumni and friends love this University and want to give back to it," Crowell said. "I am always impressed by their extraordinary loyalty and the generosity of their giving. Carolina is a special place and our friends help us stay that way."
Friends have helped the University from the beginning. Gifts of land and cash created the Chapel Hill campus in 1792 and largely sustained it for its first hundred years. In 1916 President Edward Kidder Graham reported that of the 29 buildings then existing on campus, 22 had been gifts.
It wasn't until after World War I that the modern era of large legislative appropriations began. Even so, philanthropy continued to be important to the University. Some of the great names are memorialized in campus buildings: Hill Hall, George Watts Hill Alumni Center, Kenan Stadium and the Morehead Planetarium.
Private giving still pays for all or part of many needed buildings, including the Kenan-Flagler Business School's McColl Building, the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center building addition, the Center for Dramatic Art, the renovation of Graham Memorial Hall for the James M. Johnston Center for Undergraduate Excellence, and the planned Sonja Haynes Stone Black Cultural Center building.
In addition, private gifts fund many scholarships and fellowships, most endowed professorships and all purchases for the library's special collections (Southern Historical, North Carolina and Rare Books).
Although state support of Carolina is generous (31 percent in 1998), taxpayers alone cannot sustain the excellence expected of the University, Crowell said.
"The extra edge that consistently puts Carolina among the top public universities in the nation comes from private support," Crowell said. "What's more, it is also one of the best ways alumni and friends of the University can stay involved in the campus and ensure that the experiences they had at Carolina will be guaranteed for future generations of Tar Heels."
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