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Endowment Giving at SXU

Creating a Legacy

Saint Xavier University provides a transformative educational experience, empowering students to make positive, meaningful impacts in their careers, families, and communities.

These life-changing opportunities are made possible by the generosity of forward-thinking donors. An endowed gift is one of the most powerful ways to create a lasting legacy, as it spans generations and touches countless lives. Endowments provide the vital financial stability that allows SXU to enhance students' educational experiences now and in the future.

Because of donors like you, Saint Xavier can continue its Mercy mission of educating students to seek truth, think critically, communicate effectively, and serve wisely and compassionately, supporting human dignity and the common good.

 New SXU smiling with parents by their sides

How Does the Endowment StrenGthen SXU?

SXU Nursing student during the white coat ceremony

The endowment creates a solid financial foundation for the future, providing a reliable income source to fulfill SXU's mission and allowing the University to weather short-term economic fluctuations.

Much of SXU's endowment is restricted to specific purposes, such as scholarships and faculty, student or program support, as designated at the time of the gift. This determined funding ensures continued support for those purposes. You may also make endowment gifts with broad goals, providing maximum flexibility to realize SXU's potential.

How an Endowment Works

When you establish an endowed fund, SXU invests your gift as part of its overall earnings portfolio. Each year, a portion of the value of your endowed fund is paid out to support its designated purpose, such as a scholarship or a professorship. Any remaining earnings are used to build the endowment's value. This way, an endowment fund can grow and provide support for its purpose in perpetuity.

  1. Donor makes gift to SXU and decides to endow it for a specific purpose.
  2. The gift is invested by "buying" into SXU's Pooled Investment Fund.
  3. The amount of earned income available is based on the current spending policy.
  4. Earnings are distributed quarterly and directed to the purpose of the gift.
  5. Principal continues to grow in perpetuity, resulting in increased earnings each year.

SXU football player juking near the sidelines


Contact University Advancement

What Your Endowment Can Do

Giving Level Generates About Benefit
$1,000,000 $50,000/year
  • Provides program support and space needs for Ludden Speech and Language Clinic
  • Supports a full-time student advisor in Center for Learning and Student Support or Career Development Center
  • Provides salary support and dicretionary funds for holders of endowed positions
$250,000 $12,500/year
  • Provides cutting edge technology for students majoring in computer science
  • Purchases IV Pumps and other equipment for Nursing Simulation Lab
  • Covers one third tuition for a full-time undergraduate student
$100,000 $5,000/year
  • Purchases uniforms for an athletic team
  • Covers the travel costs for athletic teams
  • Funds a career development workshop for juniors and seniors
$50,000 $2,500/year
  • Funds a lecture for Black History Month
  • Funds activities for student leadership development programs
  • Supports the cost of weekend Campus Ministry retreats
$25,000 $1,250/year
  • Purchases items for Champs Kitchen, which provides free items to students struggling with food insecurity
  • Provides funding for athletic trainers and rehab equipment for student athletes
  • Covers conference fees for continuing education for nursing faculty

Endowment Giving Opportunities

Saint Xavier offers many opportunities for donors to establish endowed funds. Named endowment opportunities start at $25,000 and can support any area of SXU. Endowments may be named for the donor or in honor of someone special.

Minimum Gift Level Fund Types

*Note that minimum gift levels may vary depending on scale of program/position.

$5,000,000+

Colleges

$1,500,000+

Centers, Programs or Departments

Naming a center, program or department is one of the most visible and important legacies that can be established at SXU. These endowments recognize a program's achievements, provide necessary resources to build upon them, and offer the stability and support needed to become a force in the academic world. They challenge faculty and staff to unite across disciplines and fields to provide the best possible education for SXU students.

Academic programs are the core of the University, fostering disciplinary rigor and providing intellectual homes for students and faculty. Supporting an academic department ensures that a program has the resources and flexibility to lead in education, research, and service.

Each gift reflects the donor's highest ideals, ensuring that those ideals remain an enduring and dynamic part of SXU for generations to come.

$1,000,000+

Professorship, Dean, Department Director, Program Director, Senior Administrator

$250,000+

Early Career Professorship, Administrator, Coaching Position

Endowed professorships represent the highest academic honor an institution can bestow upon faculty. These appointments typically recognize individuals who have achieved the highest levels of teaching, scholarship, research, and service in their disciplines. Early career professorships support faculty in the beginning stages of their careers and are held for a specific duration.

Endowed administrative positions support the recruitment and retention of key administrators at SXU. These appointments recognize professional accomplishments and are made upon assumption of leadership roles associated with endowed positions.

Endowed coaching positions support SXU's commitment to student athletics. Endowing a coaching position for a specific sport is crucial for recruiting and retaining the best and most talented coaches.

 

$100,000+

Graduate Fellowships

Gifts for graduate fellowships help SXU recruit and retain the highest achieving, creative, and innovative advanced-degree candidates. By covering tuition and basic living expenses, fellowships ensure that graduate students can focus on their studies rather than the cost of education.

$50,000+

Lectureship, Mission and Heritage

Endowed lectureships are essential to the intellectual enrichment of SXU students, faculty, staff, and the local community. Lectures by visiting speakers promote interdisciplinary dialogue, connect students with leaders across various professions and fields, and attract public and media attention to SXU's academic community.

Funds to support Saint Xavier's mission and heritage help to promote and deepen the University community's understanding of and engagement with its Catholic identity and foster and enliven the University community's appreciation for and embodiment of Saint Xavier's Mercy heritage, past and present.

$25,000-$50,000+

Scholarships

A financial aid endowment offers donors the opportunity to shape a scholarship that reflects their passions and values by specifying multiple criteria for recipients. This can include rewarding student leaders or academic achievers from a particular community or supporting students in a preferred major.

Scholarships help create a vibrant and diverse academic community where all individuals -- regardless of ethnicity, gender, or other personal characteristics -- can reach their full potential.

Donors who establish a scholarship at the $25,000 level can choose one preference, such as a general area of study (e.g., nursing, arts and sciences). Donors of scholarships at higher levels may choose multiple preferences, such as a specific major (e.g., accounting, biology), specific sport, geographic area, or high school.

$25,000+

Target Endowed Funds

These endowed funds may be established in support of a specific purpose. Examples include:

Enhance current programs by funding new initiatives, research, equipment, faculty development, or student enrichment activities.

Contributions to Student Support provide funds to enhance the student experience outside the classroom, such as study abroad programs, internships, Champ's Kitchen, student government, and clubs and organizations.

These endowed funds sustain SXU's most vital needs by contributing unrestricted, discretionary funds that can be used for any number of causes by the president, deans, coaches or other leaders to advance SXU's mission.

Research endowments can support a project in its initial stages or provide supplemental funding for projects only partially covered by grants and other funding.

Both students and faculty depend
on the University's library holdings,
which include print publications,
digital media, and archival materials.
An endowment can ensure that SXU
continues to deepen and refresh its
collections in areas of special interest
to donors.

Contributions to Athletics provide funds for SXU's 20 varsity sports teams, covering resources for travel, facilities, equipment, and support for coaches to scout, recruit, and develop exceptional players and students. Donors can also establish funds to support individual teams.

SXU has a beautiful campus that students, alumni, faculty and staff call home. Marked with a plethora of historic sites and symbols, a glittering lake, and lush greenery, the campus is a neighborhood landmark that attracts visitors all year long. The beauty of campus enhances student well-being and encourages moments of rest and tranquility. Contributions to campus improvement help ensure the completion of projects that enhance campus beautification, innovation and safety.


Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ's)

Endowed funds are "forever gifts" that create an enduring legacy of support for Saint Xavier University. An endowed fund is a permanently invested fund where the earned income will provide support for a general or specific purpose. The gift's principal (or corpus) is never touched but continues to generate income in perpetuity.

Endowed funds may be created for scholarships, professorships, athletics, research, student support and programs.

Quasi-endowments are funds earmarked by the Board of Trustees -- rather than by donors -- to act like permanently restricted funds from which income is available for general operations or certain specific purposes. Essentially, the board treats some unrestricted funds as an endowment, keeping them invested in the institution's investment portfolio. Accordingly, these funds are not reported as "permanently restricted" on the organization's financial statements. Quasi-endowments are sometimes referred to as "funds functioning as an endowment," "board-designated endowments," or "unrestricted endowments."

SXU remains very dependent on tuition dollars. However, our ability to continue raising tuition is limited. The ability of parents to fund education has been growing at a slower rate than the growth rate of tuition, and tuition has been growing at a faster rate than inflation. Endowment resources help relieve the University's dependence on these diminishing tuition revenues.

A healthy endowment eases pressure on the University's operating budget and means that SXU's values and priorities, rather than external forces, influence University decisions to a greater degree.

A strong endowment, in addition to providing stability for the future, allows SXU faculty and administrators to pursue critical initiatives that enhance our ability to be a regional leader in higher education.

Students benefit from endowments for scholarships, fellowships, athletics and the excellent teaching, programs, and research initiatives that endowment support helps make possible. Through endowment resources, activities can be supported that might not otherwise have had a chance to exist. In addition, a strong endowment enables the University to offer more scholarships and University-based financial aid, which in turn helps in the recruitment and retention of the most qualified students.

As of June 30, 2024, SXU's endowment comprised 95 individual funds totaling approximately $48,413,323. These figures incorporate donor restricted endowment funds and funds designated to function as endowments.

In FY24, the endowment payout covered approximately 2.2% of SXU's overall operating budget. Without this stable source of annual income, SXU would need to make up the difference by cutting expenses, raising tuition, or both. The more the endowment grows, the less SXU must rely on other sources of revenue.

An endowment can be established in various ways, from outright gifts to future gifts, such as charitable trusts and bequests. Donors may fund endowments as a single gift or spread the payments over several years as a pledge.

SXU offers many opportunities for donors to establish newly named endowed funds. Endowment gifts may be directed to a specific purpose, such as scholarships or professorships, or be designated for use by a particular college, department, sport, or program. Endowments may be named for the donor or in memory or honor of someone.

In addition to scholarships, SXU offers many other endowment opportunities, including funds for athletics and/or individual sports, professorships, fellowships, library funds, campus maintenance funds, research and innovation initiatives, and lecture series. The University Advancement staff works closely with prospective donors to help them establish an endowed fund that meets the mutual interests and goals of the donor and the University.

SXU has set minimum gift levels for different endowed funds to ensure sufficient income is available annually to support their designated purpose. Named endowment opportunities start at $25,000.

Yes, donors can make a gift of any size to an existing endowment fund. An existing endowment may reflect a donor's area of interest to which they can contribute. Many donors who have previously established endowment funds continue making gifts to them over time. The larger a fund is, the more it can do each year.

While named endowed funds require minimum amounts, gifts of any amount may be added to an existing endowed fund or to the University's unrestricted endowment.

There are many ways to make a gift to SXU's endowment. Gift opportunities fall into several basic categories: outright gifts, which are available for immediate investment by the University; life income gifts, in which the University receives money immediately while providing the donor or someone they designate with an income for life; or bequests, in which the University receives the gift upon the death of the donor.

Gifts (including payments in the case of pledges) to the endowment begin to generate income the first quarter after they are invested in the pooled endowment.

Endowment payout earned on funds that support unrestricted operations or have a broad purpose (scholarship, program, academic area) are reflected as current-year operating revenue in SXU's annual 11 financial statements, so there is never any unspent income.

Funds with a donor intent that is more narrowly defined (professorship, lecture) have a payout that is expense-based. Payout on these funds is not reflected until current-year costs are applied to the fund account code. Unspent payout is reinvested into the fund's principal.

When an endowed gift is made, the funds are placed in SXU's long-term investment pool and converted into units within the pool. The University's chief financial officer manages the portfolio of funds, along with an outside investment firm.

Each year, SXU spends "investment income" (also called the "spending distribution" or "payout") from each endowed fund. SXU's endowment includes donor-restricted funds and funds designated by the Board of Trustees (quasi-endowment) to function as endowments.

SXU's target policy distribution rate is 5% of a three-year moving average of the endowment's per-share market value. A three-year moving average provides greater predictability in budgeting by smoothing the impact on distributions of year-to-year market fluctuations.

Alumni, parents, and friends of SXU who make endowment gifts are attracted to the opportunity to ensure that the institution, or a particular program or activity, will exist in perpetuity. Many SXU alumni, parents, and friends have associated their own names with gifts to SXU's endowment and receive recognition inside and outside the University community for their gifts. Behind each endowment gift is a personal motivation -- to repay a debt of gratitude for the donor's own education, to honor a loved one, and/or to make a positive impact on society.