Create an Endowment

Endowments and memorial gifts provide an opportunity to commemorate your area of interest while making a gift in honor or in memory of a loved one. There are a variety of special gift opportunities to allow donors to support a particular program of the college, including scholarships, faculty research and athletics. 

How an Endowment Works

Here's how one type of endowment – an endowed scholarship – can work:

• An alumna makes a $50,000 gift to the School of the Business to establish a named endowed scholarship in memory of her mother.
• A gift agreement is drawn up between Geneseo and the donor, guaranteeing that her gift will be added to the general endowment fund to be used solely for its stated purpose.
• The donor's named scholarship fund buys units in the College's larger endowment pool, much as one buys shares in a mutual fund.
• The Geneseo Foundation Board's Investment and Endowment Committee invests the donor's gift across major assets in the College's portfolio to maximize return.
• As predetermined by the Investment and Endowment Committee, a portion of the annual income generated by the named fund's investments is used to provide a scholarship for one business student per year – the fund's principal remains intact and is never spent. The remainder of the earned income, minus the payout, is returned to the named fund's principal, hedging against inflation and ensuring growth.
• The named fund continues to grow, thereby ensuring that the current scholarship support is the same or greater in the future.

This is just one example of how an endowment gift can have a lasting impact; there are wide range of endowment gift options we would be happy to discuss with you. For more information about creating an endowment, please email us at fund@geneseo.edu or call 585-245-5518. 

Learn About Naming Opportunities

Endowment and memorial gifts provide opportunities to commemorate a particular area of interest while honoring a loved one. You may choose to support a particular program of the college, provide scholarships for talented students who rely on financial aid to attend Geneseo, or establish grants so our outstanding faculty can continue to develop their teaching and research. For more information about creating an endowment or memorial gift in honor of a loved one, please email us at fund@geneseo.edu or call 585-245-5518.