Giving Back: Over 90% Participation Seen in Class of 2015 Gifts

It might seem a slightly strange idea when you consider the considerable costs involved in taking an MBA, but ‘giving back’ when you graduate from a leading business school in the US is a long-standing tradition.

This takes the form of an annual class gift, in which all contributions from an MBA cohort are represented and commonly compared to classes that have gone before you, both in terms of the final sum raised and the percentage of a class that has chipped in.   

With the height of summer now upon us, class of 2015 gift totals are starting to come in and a couple of records have already been broken.

MIT Sloan: 93% contribute to class gift

MIT Sloan has just announced that 93% of its class of 2015 (from the MBA and Leaders for Global Operations (LGO) programs combined) contributed to this year’s class gift, equaling a participation record that was set last year. However, the school’s EMBA class has now managed 100% participation for the third year straight – although, considering that class’ professional seniority and part-time study status, higher participation is perhaps to be expected. The EMBA-giving sum, of US$518,665, also dwarfs its full-time MBA equivalent and is a new record for the school.

These donations are funneled into MIT Sloan’s annual fund, which is generally designed to support the school’s operating costs and ensure that the next generations of MBA students have the same – or better – facilities and opportunities as the students of today. Indeed, the tuition fees paid by students are said to cover 63% of MIT Sloan’s operating budget, leaving a substantial shortfall to which this kind of philanthropy contributes.

In comparison, tuition brings in 56% of annual revenue to the Wharton School. Its ongoing class of 2015 gift campaign seems to be coming along nicely, having recently passed the US$100,000 mark from a participation rate of 64% at the time of writing.

Two further MBA class of 2015 gifts that have been recently announced both posted participation rates in the 90s – Emory University’s Goizueta Business School received contributions from 95% of its full-time MBAs graduating this year, while Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School of Business achieved a 97% rate to reach a new class gift high of more than US$37,000.

Dartmouth Tuck leads way for participation in alumni giving

A graduating MBA cohort’s class gift is but one aspect of regular philanthropy that feeds back into a school’s operations as alumni go on to enjoy successful and financially lucrative MBA careers. All told, philanthropy at Wharton is said to be worth 18% of its annual revenue, for example. Meanwhile, at Dartmouth Tuck School of Business, annual giving from alumni and friends is said to provide around 8% of the school’s operating budget. Figures such as these underline the fact that US schools rely on these gifts coming in each year.

Indeed, the value of this year’s annual alumni giving campaign at Dartmouth Tuck was recently announced as being worth US$6.4 million, a figure that has seen incremental rises each year since the US$5.7 million amount received in 2012. Dartmouth Tuck just so happens to be an established leader for the breadth of the support it enjoys from its alumni, with a participation rate of over 70% for the fifth straight year in 2015’s reckoning – something the school says is more than double the average giving rate seen at other schools. By way of comparison, 2014’s alumni participation rate at Harvard Business School, Chicago Booth and MIT Sloan were all no higher than 25% and Yale SOM was recently singled out for its success in raising its alumni participation rate from 45% to 52% this year – still some distance behind the rate at Dartmouth Tuck. Of course, the smaller class sizes and close-knit community for which Tuck is known have clearly laid the groundwork for this level of engagement and sense of camaraderie its graduates feel for the school’s continued wellbeing.

Outside of the US and in the world’s second favorite MBA study destination - the UK - the custom of class giving is something that has developed much more recently. It was 1997 before an MBA class gift was first given to Saïd Business School, University of Oxford, for instance – and even then it was a surfboard as opposed to cash! However, since then, the tradition has taken root, with Saïd’s MBA class of 2010 currently holding the record for the amount raised by a single class, at more than £13,000 (c.US$20,000).