MBA friends Magazine MBA friends Magazine 1 issue | Page 4

One of the most famous American business schools, Harvard Business School receives
an annual total donation in the amount of approximately $ 100 million ($ 129 million in
2012), while the total University fund (" Endowment Fund ") collected donations
amounting to $ 2.8 billion1. Furthermore , in its annual report for 2012,HBS states that
12,000 alumni made a donation, while CNN Money states that the median (not
average) donation amounts to $ 250 dollars per alumni2. All donations ($ 129 million in
2012) were not done only by alumni, but also from other donors and institutions. From
this we can conclude that some alumni give a lot more than $ 250 dollars a year. In the
table below, published by CNN Money it states that the Tuck Business School
(Dartmouth College in New Hampshire) is the leader on the base whose alumni
donated. In fact 67% of their alumni gave a kind of donation. The author of this article
concludes, that in fact their alumni are actually the most satisfied with their education.
Can we say that this is the reason for donating? A a sign of gratitude (some kind of
"tip") for an already fulfilled service?

Table 1: The percentage of alumni that have donated (source: CNN Money)
As an individual donor, the record amount of a donation to a business school, by today,
was done by David G. Booth. In 2008 he donated $ 300 million to the business school
of the University of Chicago. Since then, this business school is called the University of
Chicago Booth Business School. David G. Booth clearly didn’t forget his MBA experience
after 37 years. He completed his MBA in 1971. After him, the largest donation to a
Business School was done by Philip H. Knight, the owner of "Nike". He has donated $
100 million to Stanford. He’s followed by Stephen M. Ross, who donated $ 100 million
dollars to the University of Michigan business school, which now bears his name Ross.
He is then followed by the donation of $ 100 million dollars from Henry Kravis to
Columbia Business School3. An interesting one is also the donation from John Edward
Anderson to UCLA Anderson Business School (University of California, Los Angeles). He
donated a total of $ 49 million, but the name "Anderson", was added back in 1987,
when he donated "only" $ 15 million. What is even more interesting is that he has not
1

Source: HBS Annual Report 2012
CNN Money: "Which B - schools have the most satisfied alumni?" May 31 2011
3
Source : AACSB database ( available at www.aacsb.edu ) . Note that all donations are listed in this source are not necessarily just for " MBA "
2