Officials at Colorado State University have reached their $500 million goal for the university’s first-ever fundraising campaign–six months ahead of schedule.
The private donations from about 90,000 have been spent on facility construction, maintenance, creating new chairs and professorships. But CSU President Tony Frank says the most important accomplishment is 15,372 student scholarships created by the campaign.
“That’s going to be an important facet of going forward: making sure that people with the ability and drive to earn a college degree have access to the same education that we did when we were younger,” he said after a celebration event on the CSU campus.
Frank said fundraising efforts will continue, but didn’t have details on a future campaign.
The news comes as higher education budgets continue to lose state funding and face an estimated $30 million in cuts this coming year.
Raising private funds has become increasingly important for schools like CSU as state funding continues to decline. Earlier this year, the University of Colorado System announced an ambitious $1.5 billion dollar fundraising campaign.
