Institutionalization of Fundraising in Higher Education

• In Event: Dissertation workshop session
  In Special Session: Higher Education and Human Development

Proposal

Today, development offices are nearly universal at colleges and universities in the United States. While there are some variations, colleges and universities generally have central development offices and satellite offices at each of the individual units, schools, and other divisions that make up the institution (Thelin & Trollinger, 2014). The responsibilities of these offices generally encompass annual giving, corporate giving, foundation relations, planned giving, major gifts, and campaign fundraising (Thelin & Trollinger, 2014), and may also incorporate other advancement activities outside of fundraising, including alumni relations, internal and external communications, public relations, and government relations (Worth, 2002). There are indications that this model appears to be spreading globally (Drezner & Huehes, 2015; Worth, 2002), yet, research remains relatively marginalized (Drezner & Huehes, 2015; Brittingham & Pezzullo, 1990; Proper & Cabroni, 2014).

In my dissertation, I examine how private fundraising has professionalized in the modern American university, the influence of professional fundraising on higher education, and the role of professional associations in field-building and spreading these practices globally. American higher education has been grounded in a spirit of entrepreneurialism and focused on private philanthropy from its creation, however fundraising in higher education was not always such a highly professionalized process. Not only are universities committed to fundraising, but development offices and their fundraising activities have become part of standardized structures and practices in the leadership of the university. I examine the following aspects of the development of institutional advancement:
1. How has higher education fundraising become institutionalized?
a. How has the solicitation of private funds become a well-defined administrative process?
2. What fundraising practices become incorporated as part of institutional advancement in higher education?
3. What is the role of the larger philanthropic field in shaping the practices of the modern development office of the university?
a. Who is involved in shaping these practices and what role do they play?

Taking a neo-institutional approach, my dissertation takes a descriptive, field-level approach to examine how higher education fundraising has professionalized. My study takes the format of three complementary chapters of my dissertation. The first paper is a descriptive field-level analysis of the development office in the modern American university. Using a web survey, this first paper focuses on the current institutional structures of leadership and development offices. I am currently concluding the analysis and beginning the writing stage of this paper.

The second paper will seek to understand the influence of these highly-institutionalized fundraising practices on higher education. The purpose of this textual analysis is to explore the role of the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) in professionalizing and shaping the modern development office and establishing the field of institutional advancement in higher education in the United States. Higher education administration engaged in fundraising practices were highly aware and cognizant of their efforts as they strove to build a professional field. At this stage in the research, professionalization and field development, will be generally defined as the intentional creation of norms, practices, and defining the standards of their field. Through a textual analysis of CASE’s monthly periodicals, “Currents”, the American College Public Relations Association’s (ACPRA) monthly periodicals, “Pride”, and the Greenbrier Report, I examine how professional associations actively promoted the professionalization of fundraising practices and development offices in the United States. I am currently finishing the data collection portion of this paper and beginning the data analysis.

The final aspect of this analysis will examine the role of professional associations in field-building, by examining how practices are spreading globally. This final chapter will examine CASE, as part of the larger philanthropic field, in promoting the diffusion of fundraising in higher education globally, by examining monthly periodicals and other documents and interviewing key stakeholders. This research will support future comparative research on development in higher education. For the final paper, I am currently in the process of data collection.

I attend Stanford University and my dissertation faculty advisor is Dr. Francisco Ramirez.

Author

• Nadine Skinner, Stanford University