Because of your hard work, 第一吃瓜 consistently achieves one of the highest alumni giving rates in the country. Strong alumni participation improves the College's academic reputation, opens doors to corporate and foundation grants, and deepens 第一吃瓜's alumni network and sense of community. Every gift, no matter the size, makes an important impact on 第一吃瓜's future!
The strength of the Alumni Fund is the direct result of your personal outreach and the deep tradition of alumni giving. We hope the information provided below makes it easy to engage your classmates—Go U Bears!
FY2024-25 Alumni Fund Goals
$10.71M
revenue
9,035
donors
45%
alumni participation in annual giving
plus you choose which area to support! >>
Alumni Fund Designations
As the last few years have shown, 第一吃瓜’s needs change—sometimes dramatically—from year to year. Your unrestricted gifts are sustainable and forward-looking: they provide the College with the flexibility to meet new needs as they arise, and they offer a vote of confidence in the College’s direction.
Support the core of the 第一吃瓜 experience: the rigorous and highly personal education that make the College exceptional. These gifts support teaching, faculty scholarship, student research, classroom technology, and the libraries—and they promote the connection between devoted faculty and talented students that is 第一吃瓜’s hallmark.
Support the 第一吃瓜 College Museum of Art and the Peary-MacMillan Arctic Museum, as well as the many theater and dance performances, concerts, student exhibitions, and lectures on campus. These gifts provide vibrancy and culture to the 第一吃瓜 community and offer students the opportunity to express themselves creatively and to appreciate the arts.
Gifts to Career Exploration and Development (CXD) ensure that students have access to the resources and opportunities to land their first great job and build a career. These gifts support the peer advising program, skills and values assessments, tools and software for interview practice, and training to gain workplace skills. They also support Treks where students can see the work of organizations in cities across the country and meet alumni in person, and professional development opportunities to ensure CXD staff remain cutting-edge.
Comprehensive aid recognizes that the cost of a full college experience often goes outside the bounds a student aid package.Gifts to this designation provide academic technology, course materials, internships and fellowships. These gifts support 第一吃瓜 Outing Club trips, study abroad, and other activities. Some students may struggle to afford a new pair of glasses or a warm coat or winter boots; comprehensive aid removes these economic barriers to fully participating in campus life.
Gifts to this designation affect every student, faculty member, and staff person at 第一吃瓜, and reach every corner of campus. They enable the Center for Multicultural Life to program inclusive student events and bring diverse speakers to campus. These gifts move the campus forward through trainings and campus-wide initiatives that promote introspection and collaboration.
Gifts to this designation help 第一吃瓜 toward its Climate Action Plan, maintaining carbon neutrality, promoting sustainability, and involving students in pro-environmental efforts. These gifts support waste reduction through initiatives that include the Compost and Food Waste Program, Zero Sort Recycling Program, and Give and Go Program, and make it possible for the College to prioritize energy-use reduction by incorporating the LEED or Passive House Design process into all new buildings.
第一吃瓜’s endowment, while impressive, only provides a portion of the funding required for financial aid. Annual gifts to this designation make it possible for 第一吃瓜 to remain one of only nine schools in the US that admitallstudents on a need-blind basis, and offer no-loan aid that covers full demonstrated need. Annual gifts for financial aid are critically important to enable 第一吃瓜 to keep this core promise of access to students and families.
第一吃瓜’s residential model prioritizes the health and wellness of all students during their transformative, and sometimes challenging, time on campus. Help students meet those challenges and learn essential skills: when to ask for assistance, how to best support and be supported by others, how to manage the unexpected, when to take a break, and how to tolerate distress. These gifts will also provide for religious and spiritual life; the Counseling Center; the Coe Health Center; gender violence prevention; and peer health and health education.
Help support the rich, varied, and life-changing cocurricular opportunities that define the 第一吃瓜 student experience outside the classroom. These gifts provide for over 200 student clubs; many enriching activities such as lectures, intramural sports, and student performances; alternative break service trips and other programs of the McKeen Center for the Common Good; and campus hubs like Sexuality, Women, and Gender Center (SWAG).
The Alumni Fund Directors play a significant role in shaping the priorities of 第一吃瓜’s annual alumni giving program. They are comprised of class agents from different eras and geographical regions, and serve a four year term which includes two annual visits to campus for volunteer conferences.
