Establish an Endowment
Endowments provide perpetual funds for student scholarships, graduate fellowships, faculty and research support, and a range of programs, facilities, and services. By establishing an endowed fund, you can make an impact lasting for generations.
By virtue of being endowed, these funds provide a consistent level of support, in inflation-adjusted dollars, in perpetuity. The University invests the principal of endowed funds and uses only the investment income for your specified purposes.
Endowment Opportunities
Faculty Support
Endowments help us to maintain and enhance the College of Natural Science’s tradition of faculty excellence. Examples include the establishment of chairs and professorships intended to recruit and retain accomplished scholars; support for innovative new ideas and projects; and improved classrooms and laboratories.
Scholarships & Fellowships
Private scholarship support remains the key to attracting an outstanding undergraduate student body. A gift of a named scholarship provides financial support to help bright, talented, and committed young people receive an education.
Our graduate programs consistently attract outstanding students whose imagination and discipline contribute much to the research and education at the University. The College of Natural Science must increase its fellowship support to continue to encourage the best students to pursue graduate programs here.
College & Department Needs
Many other opportunities are available to meet special college or department needs. The giving level is dependent upon the nature and scope of the donor’s interest. Excellence funds provide a perpetual source of unrestricted funding to meet urgent needs and new challenges as they arise.
Naming Opportunities
For many donors, naming opportunities are the crowning philanthropic act in a lifetime of giving. By endowing a professorship, scholarship, or a department fund, your gift will influence generations of the College of Natural Science students and faculty.
Establishing an Endowment
You may establish an endowed fund with a minimum $50,000 gift for certain purposes, such as providing unrestricted resources for an academic unit or for a partial student scholarship. The amount varies for endowed professorships or other programs.
You may establish an endowed fund in several ways:
- Donating cash;
- Donating securities;
- Creating a planned gift such as an annuity, charitable remainder trust or by making a bequest in your will;
- A combination of these options.
We would be happy to answer your questions about establishing an endowed fund. The opportunities to support endowments in the College of Natural Science are limitless. Please contact a member of the NatSci Advancement Office staff at (517) 353-9855 or email us with your questions – natsci4u@msu.edu.