Fund Raising for Academic Libraries: What Works, What Doesn't?

Introduction During the recent recession, academic libraries in the United States of America have had to endure significant budget cuts. Funding continues to go down at the same time the cost of materials and staff continues to increase. This has created an untenable situation of annual reductions to acquisitions budgets and the layoff of library staff. Not surprisingly, academic libraries have looked at other ways to fund their budgets. One of these is an increasing emphasis on fund raising. Turning to fund raising, though, poses many questions. What works for raising money for an academic library? What doesn't work? How does this differ from other kinds of fund raising in higher education? The library literature is not deep on the topic of library development (Wedgeworth, 2000) so it can be difficult to discover what is being done successfully in the field. Further, library directors often do not like fund raising work. As Riggs and Sabin (1988) wrote, "A lot of directors indicate that public relations and fund-raising are soft areas" (p. 137). Most large academic libraries employ one or more professional fund raisers know as academic library development officers to seek external funds. This qualitative study presents what academic library development officers perceive as being successful methods of fund raising. It also presents what these individuals believe does not work. Literature Review Alkin (1992) wrote, "The increasing size, diversity, professionalism, and activism of private philanthropy have made it a powerful actor in education during the twentieth century" (p. 1001). However, this status took time to reach these heights. There can be no certainty when the first philanthropic action was taken on behalf of an institution of higher education in the United States. However, three clergymen from Massachusetts are recorded as having raised 500 pounds for Harvard College, Yale College, and William and Mary College in the 1600s (Gurin & Til, 1990). The first significant voice supporting philanthropy towards higher education was that of George Whitefield. Whitefield was an English preacher who toured what would become the United States of America in 1739. He was a major figure in the religious Great Awakening of the 1730s and 1740s. His many sermons advocated charity for a variety of causes, among them, educational institutions such as Harvard and Dartmouth (Cutlip, 1965; Gurin & Til, 1990). The first collegiate alumni society was founded in 1821 at Williams College (Brittingham & Pezzullo, 1990). Other private institutions followed, although it would be at least 70 years before the first public university alumni societies formed (Dolibois, 1977). These alumni societies provided colleges and universities with a new way to solicit funds from their graduates. The fundraising potential of these associations was substantial. As an example, Harvard University successfully completed an alumni fund raising drive in 1905 generating a total of $2.4 million (Cutlip, 1965). In 1891, the Kansas University Endowment Association was formed at the University of Kansas with the direct intent of getting funds from alumni (Worth, 1982). Legon (2005) noted that the earliest collegiate foundations were established to "facilitate land acquisition and, eventually, to accept private gifts" (p. 3). Large research universities developed in the United States of America between the late 1800s and 1920. These institutions of higher education could not have developed and thrived without support from American society. The Morrill Act of 1862 gave land to each state to develop new institutions of higher education (Grub & Lazerson, 2005). Public support of higher education was a clear goal of Americans at this time (Carrigan, 1988). As noted, for example, John D. Rockefeller gave $600,000 in 1889 to help establish the University of Chicago (Cutlip, 1965). The decade of 1919 to 1929 was referred to by Davis (1985) as "the golden age of fund raising" (p. …