June 27, 2024

University of Colorado raises $4 billion in largest fundraising campaign in CU history

DENVER – Donors to the University of Colorado invested $4 billion in philanthropic gifts across CU’s four campuses during the Essential CU fundraising campaign, which successfully concluded in December 2023 as the largest in university history.

More than 380,000 donors contributed more than 650,000 gifts during Essential CU, which CU announced publicly in January 2019 after a silent phase that began counting gifts in late 2013.

Donors supported a broad range of university priorities, including student scholarships and fellowships, faculty research and recruitment, health care, academic programs, creative endeavors and other initiatives that improve lives in Colorado and around the world.

“Thanks to our extraordinary donors — and former CU President Bruce Benson, who set it in motion — the Essential CU fundraising campaign achieved a historic level of success,” President Todd Saliman said. “We’re incredibly grateful to the CU alumni, parents, faculty, students, staff, everyday Coloradans and local companies and foundations who contributed gifts of all sizes in support of the university. Donors have a significant impact on CU and the great state of Colorado, as they support student success, transformative research and innovation, advances in health care and so much more. Their generosity ensures CU continues to find strategic solutions to today’s most urgent challenges.”

Essential CU eclipsed the previous campaign, Creating Futures, which raised $1.5 billion upon completion in 2013. Approximately 83% of gifts were less than $1,000 each, showing a broad base of donor support for Essential CU. Donors also made transformational investments in CU during the campaign, with 633 gifts of more than $1 million, 21 of which were more than $15 million.

While donors invested in numerous areas at CU, many significant gifts coalesced around those critical to a well-functioning society, notably the study and treatment of mental health challenges. Gifts in this field during Essential CU included:

  • An institute dedicated to children’s mental health and wellness was established at CU Boulder through an endowed gift in 2019. Research programs in the Renée Crown Wellness Institute focus on the study of mindfulness, compassion, belonging, and the voice of young people, families, teachers, schools and communities. Faculty researchers at the institute aim to address Colorado’s high prevalence of mental health problems and inadequate access to mental health care.
  • A gift from Lyda Hill established the National Institute for Human Resilience in 2020 at UCCS in Colorado Springs — later renamed the Lyda Hill Institute for Human Resilience. It focuses on advancing human resilience to adversity through research, therapy, community training and education. Through March, the institute’s GRIT (Greater Resilience Information Toolkit) program had trained more than 3,500 resilience coaches and provided emotional and mental health support to hundreds of thousands of people in all 50 states and 36 countries.
  • The Anschutz Foundation made several significant gifts during the campaign. This included a transformational investment in 2018 to support mental and behavioral health, the recruitment and retention of top faculty talent, research, innovative procedures, more effective medicine, industry partnerships and technology transfer at the CU Anschutz Medical Campus. The gift also led to the construction of the 396,000-square-foot interdisciplinary Anschutz Health Sciences Building that opened in 2021. The building is a nexus for personalized clinical care, the Colorado Center for Personalized Medicine, the Colorado Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute and other key areas.
  • A gift from the Salazar Family Foundation supported the construction and ongoing operation of the Lola & Rob Salazar Student Wellness Center, CU Denver’s first named building. The facility — which includes reflection spaces, a climbing wall, a three-court gym, and a six-lane pool, among other amenities — promotes multiple dimensions of student health and wellness, including programs that address students’ emotional, social, spiritual and physical well-being. The 85,000-square-foot center opened in 2018.

Donors made these other transformational gifts during Essential CU:

  • Multiple donors made large gifts to support the Benson Center for the Study of Western Civilization at CU Boulder. Based on the former CU president’s notion that CU should teach students “how to think, not what to think,” the center promotes intellectual diversity on campus in a time of increasing polarization.
  • At UCCS, The Anschutz Foundation provided a lead gift to help fund the construction of the Anschutz Engineering Building, a 23,000-square-foot facility with new labs and classrooms. The building, which opened in 2024, expands UCCS’ aeronautical research and academics and helps meet the growing demand for skilled graduates in key aerospace and technology business fields.
  • Katy and Paul Rady invested generously across CU and Colorado. A transformational gift in 2018 strengthened the partnership between CU Boulder and Western Colorado University with the construction of a state-of-the-art engineering building at Western. Completed in 2021, the Paul M. Rady Building is a key fixture for Western students earning mechanical engineering and computer science degrees from CU Boulder.
  • A separate gift from the Radys in 2022 established the Katy O. and Paul M. Rady Esophageal and Gastric Center of Excellence at CU Anschutz to advance research, clinical trials, screening, surveillance and treatments for esophageal and gastric cancers, as well as recruit leading experts in the field.
  • UCCS’ status as a top cybersecurity education leader was furthered by a gift from Kevin O’Neil, a UCCS alumnus and Colorado Springs native, in 2021. The Kevin W. O’Neil Cybersecurity Education and Research Center expanded the campus’ cybersecurity research offerings and forged new partnerships with military and industry leaders.
  • The Jake Jabs Center for Entrepreneurship was established at CU Denver by the Colorado businessman to spark collaboration among university students and entrepreneurs, provide mentoring services for new student businesses and support THE CLIMB, a business-plan competition that fosters entrepreneurism. Jabs’ generosity also supports the center’s director and faculty, research awards and the Jake Jabs Event Center, which serves as a venue for a variety of entrepreneurship and campus functions.

The campaign’s overlap with the COVID-19 pandemic also inspired donors to give generously to assist students, faculty and staff in need, as well as to health care treatments and research that battled the pandemic’s effects. Across CU’s four campuses, donors supported these priorities:

  • At CU Denver, the Loving Lynx Emergency Fund helps students who encounter unexpected hardships and financial emergencies.
  • CU Boulder’s Student Emergency Fund and the Staff and Faculty Emergency Fund provides similar support during emergency situations.
  • In Colorado Springs, the UCCS Community Support Scholarship Fund assists students who experience a one-time unexpected financial hardship.
  • Donors to CU Anschutz supported the Healthcare Worker Emergency Relief Fund at UCHealth, which helps mitigate the emotional, financial and physical toll on caregivers; the CU Anschutz Student Support Fund, which provides emergency support for students; and the Pandemic Research Fund, which supported a biobank and clinical trials to help combat COVID-19 and other infectious diseases.

Essential CU catalyzed the idea that donors give to institutions that provide our society with enduring, substantial and tangible improvements for generations to come. Together, donors and CU are essential to creating access to high-quality academics, educated future leaders of the workforce, lifesaving health care and research that advances a new economy of knowledge. That donors give to their interests is an important component of the donor-university partnership — CU must use gifts how donors intend and cannot redirect them elsewhere.

Philanthropy is one vital source of funding among many that advances CU’s mission, including these crucial areas that donors gave to during the campaign:

Expanding student opportunities was a cornerstone idea during Essential CU — ensuring talented and hardworking students have access to college, valuable academic programs and the opportunity to learn alongside the best faculty. Donors delivered, contributing more than $510 million to provide for student scholarships and fellowships.

Faculty research represented another significant focus for donors. They gave $1.4 billion to research programs to help CU’s top minds unearth new discoveries and develop innovations that address some of humanity’s most pressing questions.

Transformative health care — through patient care, personalized medicine, public health, and mental and behavioral health, among other critical areas — was a particular passion for donors during Essential CU, with $2.2 billion given.

Recruitment of bright faculty talent through endowed chairs flourished because of donor generosity. More than $297 million in gifts ensured CU could continue to attract and retain top faculty, who are essential to research, public service, teaching and encouraging talented PhD and graduate students to choose CU.

Donors also invested generously in the future, giving $754 million during Essential CU to the university’s endowment, which distributes donors’ gifts over the long term for CU’s benefit. At the start of the campaign, CU’s endowment was valued at $885 million. By the end of the campaign, it was $2.1 billion. Donors also gave $622 million in estate and other planned gifts during Essential CU.

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