image

Michigan State University (MSU) can boast of a plethora of awards and achievements as one of the country's first state land-grant universities-from cutting-edge research in medicine, engineering, and forensic science, to its scenic campus in East Lansing that's home to more than 45,000 undergraduate and graduate students pursuing some 200 areas of study.

And then there's Michigan State's memorable drives to win the 1979 and 2000 NCAA basketball championships.

But for all of its slam-dunk successes, as the state-assisted school prepared to launch a capital giving campaign more than eight years ago, its development team knew it was playing catch-up with other Big 10 schools in the fundraising arena.

Other institutions of higher learning, including cross-state rival the University of Michigan, were operating at a higher level of participation and gift-giving. "MSU is the youngest program in the Big 10," explained Marti Heil, associate vice president for university development at Michigan State. "We have not been actively fundraising as long as our sister institutions." MSU needed to increase its donor base.

With public funding of universities drying up, Michigan State officials knew they needed help to hammer out a more focused, information-based fundraising strategy. They turned to Marts & Lundy and its expertise in "blending the art and science of philanthropy."

Gifts from alumni and other individuals made up nearly 50 percent of the total, with a documented cumulative total of nearly $700 million.

They knew they could count on the firm's veteran consulting team, including Roy Muir, co-leader of Marts & Lundy's Higher Education Practice Group. Muir served as MSU's campaign counsel, continuing the university's relationship with Marts & Lundy that started in 1998.

Michigan State gave high marks to Muir and Marts & Lundy after the close of The Campaign for MSU, a record-breaking capital campaign that surpassed the university's expectations with commitments of $1.439 billion. That topped an already-ambitious overall goal of $1.2 billion for the eight-year-long effort.

Gifts from alumni and other individuals made up nearly 50 percent of the total, with a documented cumulative total of nearly $700 million.

"Marts & Lundy has a great reputation," Heil said. "We'd known Roy because he had been my counterpart for 23 years" at the University of Michigan.

The Campaign for MSU illustrates why public universities-facing shortages of state funding-must generate more of their own revenues to remain competitive and affordable.

"Nationally, public universities are experiencing a pretty steady and significant decline in tax-driven support from their states," Muir explained.

Several decades ago, he said, public universities such as MSU received about 75 percent of their general fund revenue from state coffers. "There were cases where that reached 90 percent," Muir said.

That sum has steadily dropped to 50 percent or less today, he said, with some public universities deriving less than 20 percent of general fund revenue from their state governments.