Each year, 6,500 alumni and friends support Fuqua philanthropically. Read below to see how your gifts make a tremendous impact for Fuqua students, faculty, and programs.
Dear alumni and friends,
I continue to be amazed by the love and enthusiasm you show for Fuqua in so many ways. Each year, thousands of you selflessly support the school with your time, talent, and treasure. We could not develop innovative programs, produce industry-leading research, or continually enhance the student experience without your support. Our alumni and our wider community of supporters help us fulfill our vision of producing leaders poised to make a difference in their communities and the world through the power of business.
And, while we are all experiencing unprecedented challenges, I am pleased to share with you the impact of philanthropic support over the last 18 months—support that is even more vital as we respond to these challenges.
Please take a few minutes to read below how alumni and friends make an impact at Fuqua. You are a critical part of our success, and we are deeply grateful for your ongoing commitment to and support of the school.
With warm regards,
Bill Boulding
Dean and J.B. Fuqua Professor of Business Administration
Philanthropic investments from alumni and friends play a critical role in Fuqua’s success. From supporting scholarships, faculty research and teaching, program enhancements, and everything in between, the school could not continue to rise without you.
Gifts to the Fuqua Annual Fund support nearly every aspect of the school, including scholarships, faculty research, the student experience, and program innovations. Your generous contributions are vital to helping us stay nimble and competitive while providing immediate benefits to our students. More than 6,500 donors support the Fuqua Annual Fund each year, with 34% recognized as members of the Thomas F. Keller Leadership Donor Society. In 2018-2019, 88% of the $4.72M raised in the Fuqua Annual Fund came through leadership giving.
Planning for the future
While gifts to scholarship, faculty, or programs are greatly important, unrestricted support via gifts to the Fuqua Annual Fund are critical to meeting the school’s daily operating needs and to enabling the school to innovate nimbly as student needs evolve. With your annual gift to Fuqua, you make a direct impact on the lives of current students. When you make a multi-year pledge, you exemplify your commitment to Fuqua and enable the school to anticipate future philanthropic support as part of its budgeting process.
In February 2019, Fuqua alumni and friends embraced the Valentine’s Day spirit and showed their love for Fuqua through gifts to the Annual Fund. In just five days, you helped raise $422,652 in support of merit scholarships, faculty research and teaching, programs the connect academics with practice, and innovations that keep Fuqua at the forefront of business education.
Ways to give
There are many ways to make your gift, including some that can increase the value of your contribution to Fuqua and some that have significant tax advantages.
- Online, by check, or via PayPal
- Stocks, bonds or mutual funds
- Electronic transfers
- Matching gifts through your or your spouse’s company
- Duke’s UK-registered charity, Duke U.K. Trust Limited
- Personal property or real estate
Questions? Please write to annualfund@fuqua.duke.edu.
Natasha Collins MBA ’96 has no doubt that her success today is because of the challenges she navigated and overcame during her Fuqua education. Now Senior Vice President, Market Planning and Operations at Fiserv, it is her goal to unlock that same transformational experience for future students. After many years of being a leadership donor to Fuqua, Natasha recently stepped up her commitment by making a generous multi-year pledge to the Fuqua Annual Fund.
Hari Garhwal MBA ’12 hopes his philanthropy, combined with the gifts of other alumni, will ensure Fuqua’s base of support continues to grow for years to come. Co-founder at Garhwal, Chan & Williams, a successful San Francisco-based wealth management and CPA firm, Hari’s multi-year commitment to the Fuqua Annual Fund reflects his gratitude for his Fuqua experience.
Fuqua is committed to building and sustaining a multicultural and intellectually rich environment by celebrating and valuing diversity in all its forms—opinion, background, work experience, age, ethnicity, race, belief, talent, and gender. Merit scholarships are one of the most powerful tools the school has to attract a diverse group of students who have the potential to make a big impact both at Fuqua and beyond.
Planning for the future
Funding for merit scholarships continues to be a critical need for Fuqua. Just 17% of scholarships awarded in 2019-20 came from endowed funds. The school relies on support from the Fuqua Annual Fund and the operating budget to cover the balance. This means that funding available for merit scholarships is subject to economic fluctuations, putting Fuqua at a disadvantage relative to other top business schools who fund 50% or more of their scholarships through endowment.
When it comes to building the Team Fuqua community in China, Chak Man (Joe) Wu MBA ’04 stands out as an ardent advocate, a dedicated volunteer, and a generous donor. In the same spirit with which he has shared his time and expertise with the Fuqua community, Joe has also shared his financial resources. In 2017, Joe created the Wu Family Scholarship to benefit students from China.
Gift opportunities
An endowment gift ensures that Fuqua can award scholarship funds in perpetuity.
- A gift of $100,000 provides significant scholarship assistance for a top business student.
- A gift of $300,000 endows a fund to support a student in a particular field of study or from a specific background.
- A gift of $1.5 million supports one student’s full cost of tuition and expenses.
To learn more about creating an endowed scholarship, write to giving@fuqua.duke.edu.
Top-ranked for many years for their research productivity, Fuqua’s faculty is well regarded in the academic community worldwide. Our professors’ primary focus is quality research that contributes to a greater understanding of business trends and functions. Their research is published in top journals, and many of our faculty hold leadership positions on journal editorial boards. But it is their dedication to students that truly sets them apart. With a desire to learn as well as teach and a reputation for accessibility, Fuqua’s faculty create a one-of-a-kind learning environment and maintain life-long relationships with students.
Endowed support is critical in our efforts to create chaired professorships, to fuel research that informs both academia and industry, and to ensure that Fuqua can attract and retain top scholars and teachers.
Planning for the future
As compared to peer institutions, Fuqua has a relatively low number of senior faculty in endowed professorships, with 41 at present. While the Fuqua Faculty Support Challenge brought an infusion of resources to create named chairs, additional support for faculty chairs and research remains a critical need for the school.
Fuqua Faculty Support Challenge
In December 2018, Fuqua received a $7 million grant to establish four professorships. This transformative gift from The Duke Endowment, a private foundation based in Charlotte, will match gifts of $1.75 million from donors for each of the professorships, bringing the total impact of Duke’s Fuqua Faculty Support Challenge to $14 million.
Mike Pausic MBA ’89 describes his undergraduate major in systems engineering as the genesis of his interest in decision sciences—a mindset that he has carried to business school, throughout his career, and now into his philanthropy. In 2016, he made a commitment to Fuqua to create the Strategic Decision and Risk Analysis Faculty Fund, an endowed fund to support faculty research in decision sciences. He furthered that investment in 2019 by establishing the Westgate Professorship Fund, an endowed full professorship to support a faculty member in decision sciences.
Mark Burgess MBA ’85 and his wife, Lisa, were the first to establish a professorship through The Duke Endowment’s Fuqua Faculty Support Challenge. Their gift of $1.75 million was matched dollar for dollar, endowing the Mark Steven Burgess and Lisa Benson-Burgess Professorship in the Fuqua School of Business. The holder will focus on global business, leadership and/or operations.
Gift opportunities
Endowed gifts to faculty chairs and research support Fuqua’s top scholars now and into the future.
- A gift of $100,000 or more, endowed or expendable, supports faculty research and programs that raise the school’s scholarly profile and contribute to exceptional classroom experiences for students.
- A gift of $1.5 million funds a professor of the practice—often former executives, entrepreneurs, government advisors, and others with a wealth of professional business experience.
- A gift of $3.5 million endows a named full professorship for an innovative, seasoned faculty member.
To learn more about supporting faculty, write to giving@fuqua.duke.edu.
Endowed funds for academic programs, research centers, and co-curricular programming ensure that the school has the resources to keep pace in a highly competitive, global business school environment. Funding for the school’s core academic programs is essential, and endowed gifts provide a steady source of revenue to maintain programs of top academic caliber.
Planning for the future
Because Fuqua is a relatively young business school, our endowed funds for academic and extracurricular programming are limited. Investments from the Fuqua community continue to be important to solidifying our base of support for both innovation and our day-to-day operations.
Endowed gifts for program support ensure that Fuqua can continue to provide an exceptional student experience.
- A gift of $100,000 can create an unrestricted endowment to address the school’s most pressing needs, at the discretion of the dean.
- A gift of $300,000 lends support to a particular program, center, or initiative within the school.
A recent graduate and a current Daytime MBA student, respectively, William Brody ’12, MBA ’18 and Laura Haft Brody MBA ’20 know a thing or two about the stresses of completing a rigorous MBA program. Thus, when they had the opportunity to make a meaningful impact at Fuqua, it seemed logical to focus on a new way to improve the student experience. Laura and William established the Brody Resilient Leaders Fund, an endowed fund to support student wellness and resilience-building activities at Fuqua, with the aim of giving students the skills to be strong leaders who are best positioned to make an impact in their workplaces and communities.
By notifying the school of your intention to leave a legacy gift to Fuqua, you not only allow us to recognize your generosity during your lifetime but also help the school to anticipate future income. Creating a legacy also means letting the school know how you would like to make an impact with your gift, whether through unrestricted support of the school, scholarship, faculty support, or other areas of interest.
Planning for the future
One way alumni and friends choose to create a lasting legacy is via a planned gift to Fuqua. While legacy giving often includes leaving funds to the school through one’s estate, there are many giving vehicles that can help donors reduce or eliminate capital gains or gift and estate taxes while also realizing immediate tax savings. Those making legacy commitments to Fuqua are honored as members of the Fuqua Heritage Society. Learn more about the many ways in which donors create a legacy through planned gifts.
- Will or living trust
- Charitable gift annuity
- Deferred charitable gift annuity
- Charitable remainder unitrust
- Charitable remainder annuity trust
- Remainder of retirement assets
Shawn Fields MBA ’98 might not be the person you’d picture when thinking about a person who has created a legacy gift for Fuqua. In her 40s with two children and a position teaching Spanish to sixth, seventh and ninth graders in New York, Shawn takes the long view in her relationship with her alma mater.
“I’m not in a position right now to name a building, but I hope that when I reach the end of my life I can honor a really important part of my life through this gift. I’m giving back to the place that helped form me,” Shawn explains.
Fuqua’s endowment is bolstered through philanthropic gifts to the school, with the investment income used to fund scholarships, faculty, and other designated purposes in perpetuity.
Market value of endowment as of June 30, 2019: $368,953,151
Fuqua is grateful for the generosity of our alumni and friends who carry the torch for Team Fuqua through their volunteerism, philanthropy, and embodiment of the school’s core values in your daily lives. Whether you graduated six months or 50 years ago, your continued connection to the school builds our community across the world. Thank you for your investment in Team Fuqua.