UPDATE | Development

A Message From the Business
School Campaign Co-chairs

Alumni sometimes ask: ‘Should I give to the Annual Fund or make a capital gift?’

The School of Business is in the midst of the most ambitious capital campaign in its history. As part of the university’s Create the Future: The Wisconsin Campaign, the business school’s Dean’s Advisory Board set a goal of raising $120 million by December 2006. More than $91 million has been raised to date.

Gifts and pledge commitments between January 2000 and December 2006 count toward the overall campaign goal.
Funds raised during the campaign will:

• Vastly expand and elevate the caliber of our programs that intersect with business, specifically, the MBA program and Executive Education
• Build upon existing strengths in our undergraduate program and faculty research
• Launch initiatives to engage alumni and corporate partners at a new level

As co-chairs of the business school’s campaign, we are sometimes asked to explain two distinct types of gifts.

Gifts to the Annual Fund provide flexible resources that enable the School of Business to meet urgent academic needs. The Annual Fund is used to expand student scholarships and fellowships, provide faculty incentives for recruitment and retention and create financial momentum for pioneering initiatives and programs for alumni. Many alumni contribute to the Annual Fund each year. It is critical that it be continued and expanded.

Capital gifts are typically made to targeted projects, which can be tailored to a donor’s interests. Capital gifts often provide perpetual funding for initiatives such as professorships or faculty chairs, student scholarships, MBA Center endowments and much more. Capital gifts are typically made from a donor’s assets rather than income and may be 10-20 times the size of gifts to the Annual Fund.

Alumni sometimes ask: “Should I give to the Annual Fund or make a capital gift? Which benefits the campaign the most?”

The answer is: “You should do both!” Both kinds of gifts count toward our $120 million goal, as long as they are received by December 2006. Both are essential if the School of Business is to move forward as a highly renowned business school with an outstanding faculty, excellent students and high-quality facilities.

Create the Future: The Wisconsin Campaign seeks capital gifts for new and essential projects. Annual giving continues to support important on-going programs. Both provide the margin of excellence needed to ensure the School of Business will succeed in preparing the next generation of leaders.

The School of Business is recognized worldwide for excellence and it takes both a capital campaign and an annual giving program to do the job.

While we are asking you to consider a special gift to the campaign, we also encourage you to continue to support the Annual Fund to provide needed flexibility.

Consider the Capital Campaign gift as an important commitment to add significant support to the scale of the School of Business over the next few years, as payments can be spread out. Estate gifts, including bequests, are also an effective way to support the Capital Campaign and count toward campaign goals. But, consider those payments in addition to the continuing annual support that you provide, which is so vital to delivering essential programs on an ongoing basis.

To be a top business school we need alumni who support our program. Working together, we can indeed “Create the Future.”

Curt Culver, BBA ’74, MS ‘75
Chairman and CEO
MGIC Investment Corporation

John Oros, BBA ‘71
President and COO
The Enstar Group

Campaign Co-Chairs, School of Business