Hampshire College Kicks Off Major $60M Fundraising Campaign
Five-Year “Change in the Making” Campaign to Mark Hampshire’s 50th Anniversary in 2020
Press Release – (Amherst, Mass.) Hampshire College is kicking off a major fundraising campaign with a community event tonight on campus, announcing it has raised $11.2 million in gifts toward its campaign goal of $60 million by 2024. The campaign will help launch Hampshire’s second half-century as an independent college, as Hampshire prepares to ring in its 50th anniversary year in 2020.
“Change in the Making: A Campaign for Hampshire” will harness the extraordinary outpouring of alumni and community support for the College this year and couple it with the bold new framework for the Hampshire curriculum and student experience. Its accreditation maintained last month, Hampshire is now actively reinventing its renowned academic program with innovations aimed at recruiting students, making its program more sustainable financially, and transforming higher education following the college’s mission.
The campaign is currently led by four alumni co-chairs:
Ken Burns 71F, award-winning documentary filmmaker
Gail Caulkins 73F, president of the Greenacre Foundation; former Hampshire College trustee
Lucy Ann McFadden 70F, astrophysicist (retired), Goddard Space Flight Center, NASA; member of the Hampshire Board of Trustees and chair of its Advancement committee
Julie Schecter 71F, director and trustee of numerous organizations including SHIFT Foundation; co-founder of Hampshire’s Ethics and the Common Good program; vice chair of Hampshire’s Board of Trustees and chair of its Trusteeship and Governance committee
The co-chairs are working actively to secure additional major gifts, supported by a Campaign Council, a diverse group of volunteers that represents the Board of Trustees, major donors, college leaders, faculty, staff, students, and parents. The campaign is administered by Chief Advancement Officer Jennifer Chrisler and the College’s Advancement Division staff.
Hampshire seeks to secure an additional $3 million in commitments this month before year end 2019, toward the campaign goal of $60 million in unrestricted operating support by June 30, 2024.
“We are creating a ‘big tent’ for multiple constituencies to participate, engage, and connect more deeply with Hampshire,” said Chrisler. “Our goal is to foster a genuine culture of philanthropy to secure a long future for Hampshire.”
Speaking at the kickoff event tonight, President Ed Wingenbach recognized Hampshire’s momentum in creating ambitious, achievable plans for the College’s long-term sustainability, while strengthening its mission to transform higher education and provide the education that today’s students need.
Hampshire to Host Hirshberg Entrepreneurship Institute in 2020
Contributing to its momentum, Hampshire also announces today that next summer, June 2020, the College will host the Hirshberg Entrepreneurship Institute, a high-impact two-day boot camp conceived more than 20 years ago by Hampshire alumnus Gary Hirshberg 72F, cofounder of Stonyfield Farm. To date, the Institute has served hundreds of entrepreneurs across numerous sectors at its events across the U.S., Canada, and in New Zealand. The Institute offers a highly interactive, intimate venue for entrepreneurs to learn about financing, marketing, organizational challenges, finding personal balance, and many other areas fundamental to growing an enterprise. [https://hirshberginstitute.com/]
Hampshire College Maintains Accreditation
Hampshire announced on November 23 that it remains in compliance and will continue its accreditation, according to a vote by the New England Commission of Higher Education (NECHE) at its meeting on November 22. The ruling validates the College’s new operational and financial plans and marks another critical milestone in its successful transformation.
NECHE reviewed Hampshire’s progress report and five-year plans before maintaining the College’s accreditation. Last year’s decision under previous leadership to only admit a small class this fall will affect the college’s operating budgets this year and until 2024, but Hampshire’s new financial plan maintains balanced budgets through fundraising, managing costs, and generating revenue.
The College is actively recruiting new students for 2020, and plans to rebuild from its current enrollment of 732 students to full enrollment of 1,100 students by 2023-24. Its new academic model will be built this academic year and implemented for its 50th anniversary class of Fall 2020.
Hampshire will hold its 50th anniversary celebration on campus the weekend of October 16-18, 2020. Hampshire’s first founding document was The New College Plan published in 1958 by its four partner colleges in the Five College Consortium; Hampshire opened to its first class of students in fall 1970.
Extending a Legacy of Academic Innovation
Hampshire’s new emerging model—built on its long legacy of rejecting passive lectures and exams, restrictive departments, and prescribed majors—will invite students to ask big questions and draw on approaches from any field to find answers. Responding to student interest in addressing the challenges of the 21st century, Hampshire is reorganizing itself around critical, pressing questions of our time, rather than around schools or majors or specializations, enabling more collaboration across disparate fields, and freeing students to innovate in pursuing questions never asked before. Students will continue to develop advanced entrepreneurial skills as they design their own academic program with the guidance of faculty and staff.
Hampshire was founded as a major departure from traditional colleges, empowering students to design their own program, learn to perform serious independent work, and explore freely across disciplines. The offerings of its founding partner colleges — Amherst, Mount Holyoke, and Smith Colleges, and UMass Amherst — will be essential for Hampshire to realize its new vision; the Consortium enables students of its partner institutions free, open access to a breadth of resources, including thousands of courses, libraries, symposia, certificate programs, clubs, events, transportation, and more.
Recent Fundraising History at Hampshire
The last significant fundraising campaign at Hampshire College was conducted over a four-year period (June 2014-June 2018) and raised $46.9 million. Over the past ten years, Hampshire’s fundraising efforts have consistently yielded gifts and pledges for programmatic and unrestricted operating support at an average of $7.9 million a year.
During the spring of 2019, a number of alumni volunteers stepped forward and began ambitious fundraising efforts on Hampshire’s behalf. The alums who led that fundraising are now working as part of a united effort, led by the Advancement staff and fueled by the energy of volunteer leaders.
Campaign Links
Ken Burns 71F http://kenburns.com/principals/ken-burns/
Ken Burns’s Hampshire Division III thesis documentary: https://www.hampshire.edu/news/2019/03/02/ken-burns-recalls-his-college-thesis-as-his-first-history-documentary
Jennifer Chrisler https://www.hampshire.edu/news/2019/08/28/welcome-chief-advancement-officer-jennifer-chrisler
President Ed Wingenbach https://www.hampshire.edu/presidents-office/edward-wingenbach-0
Hampshire Board of Trustees https://www.hampshire.edu/offices/board-of-trustees
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