UMF endowment funds supporting students


Endowments benefiting faculty
Gifts creating endowed faculty chairs and professorships have made it possible for the University of Minnesota to build a world-class community of scholars. These endowments help the University attract and retain top faculty by providing extra funding that can be used for research, to support graduate students, collaborate with experts around the world, purchase equipment, or in other ways. In fiscal 2007, 12 new endowed faculty positions were created, for a total of 404 at the University. This represents a powerful resource compared with the 17 endowed faculty positions in 1985.

Investing the UMF endowment
The Foundation invests its endowment for growth and to ensure that designated programs have a reliable source of funding that protects against inflation. The investment strategy is focused on long-term results, aimed at managing risk and providing stable and predictable annual payments to programs. This is accomplished by balancing higher-returning investments designed for growth in purchasing power with investments that are expected to yield a more stable return.

For the year ended June 30, 2007, the Foundation’s endowment achieved a return of 17.3 percent. For all periods shown in the chart on the right, it outperformed the market benchmark, a weighted blend of stock and bond indices that provides an objective comparison of results.

Professional oversight of UMF investments is managed by the University of Minnesota Investment Advisors (UMFIA), a non-profit subsidiary formed in 1998 to focus on long-term investment goals. UMFIA has a board of directors with expertise in financial management. Members in fiscal 2007 were James A. Lawrence, chair; Gerald B. Fischer, Judy Y. Kirk, Fred R. Friswold, Bruce C. Lueck, Benjamin S. Oehler, Dale R. Olseth, Stephen R. Pflaum, Kathleen L. Pickard, and George D. Appleby.