Harvard Ranks Third in Giving

Private gifts to Harvard rose last year, but Stanford and the University of Wisconsin-Madison both garnered more in gifts than Harvard, according to a report released last month.

Harvard raised $589.9 million last year, up from $540.3 million in 2004, when Harvard placed first, according to the annual survey by the Council for Aid to Education.

Stanford University topped the list with $603.6 million, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison was second with $595.2 million.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison benefited from a one-time $296 million donation to its medical school from Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Wisconsin, which explains its leap in the ratings from 11th place last year.

Overall, private donations to higher education increased 4.9 percent to $25.6 billion.

Ann Kaplan, the director of the survey, said those results are not surprising.

“In some ways, the findings are expected given the state of the economy. When it is relatively good, as in we’re not in a recession, it tends to go up,” she said.

Stanford edged out Harvard this year by $13.7 million. In 2004, Harvard was ahead of its West Coast rival by $16.1 million.

In an interview with The Crimson in September, Vice President for Alumni Affairs and Development Donella M. Rapier said that every five or six years, Stanford out-performs Harvard.

“I understand that they had a very good year,” she said at the time.

Trailing Harvard by almost $100 million is the University of Pennsylvania, which raised $394.2 million.

Yale ranked a distant 11th with $285.7 million.