UC Berkeley Press Release
UC Berkeley announces record fundraising year
BERKELEY – The University of California, Berkeley announced today (Friday, Aug. 26) a record fundraising year, raising $318.3 million in private support from alumni, parents and friends in the 2004-05 fiscal year. The record represents a nearly 83 percent gain from the previous year.
The total also reflects a record number of gifts to the university -- 80,234 gifts from 54,128 donors. It includes the largest international gift ever received by the campus, $40 million for health sciences research.
Compared to last year, giving by alumni and foundations showed the most dramatic increases of any donor segment. Alumni giving jumped by 69 percent to $124.6 million, while giving by foundations increased 194 percent to $129 million.
"UC Berkeley is blessed with a generous family of alumni, parents and friends whose collective giving will reap benefits for students and faculty for years to come," said Vice Chancellor for University Relations Donald McQuade.
"In very clear and measurable ways, the record amount raised this past year by the Cal family is a vote of confidence in Chancellor Robert Birgeneau, who has been welcomed warmly to the Berkeley fold," said McQuade.
A growing number of donors are also going online to give. UC Berkeley's secure online giving site -- http://givetocal.berkeley.edu/ -- registered a 45-percent increase in donors, who used their credit cards to contribute more than $1 million, selecting from more than 200 campus programs.
Top gifts for the fiscal year, which ended June 30, included:
- $40 million from the Li Ka Shing Foundation to support innovative research, including stem cell research, as part of the UC Berkeley Health Sciences Initiative. The donation, the largest international gift in the history of UC Berkeley, will go toward the Li Ka Shing Center for Biomedical and Health Sciences.
- $25 million, given anonymously for campus capital projects.
- $16 million from Col. Charles T. Travers '32. This includes a $12-million trust to endow the Department of Political Science, which has been named in honor of Travers and his late wife, Louise. It also includes $4 million to support the Cal football program.
The previous record year for private giving at UC Berkeley was in 2000-01, when the campus received $315.3 million.