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Private donors are giving\u00a0colleges and universities record amounts of money<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 along with increasingly frequent bouts of\u00a0public shame<\/a>\u00a0when they turn out to have embarrassing baggage.<\/p>\n Revelations that\u00a0Yale<\/a>,\u00a0Columbia<\/a>,\u00a0Cornell<\/a>\u00a0and other prestigious schools in the U.S. and elsewhere accepted millions over the past five years from members of the\u00a0Sackler family<\/a>\u00a0have raised questions from students and alumni. The schools kept accepting donations even as the Sacklers were being sued over their drug company\u2019s role in bringing on the U.S. opioid crisis.<\/p>\n Likewise, the willingness of\u00a0Stanford<\/a>,\u00a0Harvard<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0MIT<\/a>\u00a0to take money from disgraced financier and alleged sex trafficker\u00a0Jeffrey Epstein<\/a>\u00a0has caused upheaval on those campuses.<\/p>\n I have studied the\u00a0ethical questions school leaders face<\/a>\u00a0regarding donor dollars for more than 20 years. This new airing of institutional dirty laundry has reinforced my theory of what colleges and universities should do to protect themselves and their reputations moving forward.<\/p>\n In my view, schools need a method for dealing with donors who become dubious after a gift has been accepted. Even better, they need to create fundraising policies that set limits on what donations the school accepts and put procedures in place that protect schools and donors regardless of whether donors pass the smell test from the start.<\/p>\n I believe that institutions of higher education should let students, faculty, staff and alumni help review or create new gift acceptance policies, rather than wait for their next donor-induced public relations crisis.<\/p>\n And I feel strongly that each school should turn to their own messaging for guidance.<\/p>\n Every U.S. college and university, whether public or private, religious or secular,\u00a0spells out its mission<\/a>, visions and values.<\/p>\n For example,\u00a0Yale<\/a>\u00a0is \u201ccommitted to improving the world today and for future generations through outstanding research and scholarship, education, preservation, and practice.\u201d<\/p>\n The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign<\/a>\u00a0aims \u201cto enhance the lives of citizens in Illinois, across the nation and around the world through our leadership in learning, discovery, engagement and economic development.\u201d<\/p>\n Prescott College<\/a>, a private liberal arts college in Arizona, seeks \u201cto educate students of diverse ages and backgrounds to understand, thrive in, and enhance our world community and environment.\u201d<\/p>\n These statements aren\u2019t mere slogans. They are public expression of a societal role and of commitments to students, faculty, donors and the public.<\/p>\n Two of the best ways that colleges and universities can show students the practical side of ethics is by being transparent about their leaders\u2019 decisions and by engaging\u00a0students to think through the tough questions with them<\/a>.<\/p>\n And why not invite all students to wrestle with these ethical questions? Some schools, including\u00a0Santa Clara University<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Beloit College<\/a>, already include a student representative on their gift acceptance committees.<\/p>\n It is rare, but not unheard of, for all students to be invited to give input to leaders who are making tough decisions dealing with money.<\/p>\n At Georgetown University, in April 2019, students weighed in on whether to pay reparations to descendants of enslaved people sold by the University in 1838. Two-thirds of the students voting did more than simply show support for providing reparations. They also voted in favor of having\u00a0students pay a fee<\/a>\u00a0to fund the payments.<\/p>\n Six months later, the school said it would implement the recommendation, but\u00a0without the student fee<\/a>. Instead, school administrators decided that the university and its donors would shoulder the cost.<\/p>\n Similarly, the University of Virginia sought input from students on the design of the campus\u00a0memorial for the enslaved people<\/a>\u00a0who built its campus in the 19th century. The memorial is now under construction in Charlottesville.<\/p>\n Campus communities that receive major gifts from donors who become disgraced later on have several options.<\/p>\n They may decide to give back money from donors who have engaged in behavior deemed inconsistent with the school\u2019s values. The University of California, Los Angeles did that in 2014 when it gave $425,000 back to\u00a0Donald Sterling<\/a>, after the then-owner of the local basketball team made racist comments about Magic Johnson. UCLA also declined the balance of a\u00a0$3 million pledge<\/a>\u00a0Sterling had made to support kidney research.<\/p>\n At the other extreme, schools may keep the names of donors on their walls or associated with department chairs \u2013 even if those benefactors become a source of embarrassment.<\/p>\n For example, the\u00a0University of North Dakota<\/a>\u00a0uses a hockey arena on its campus named after\u00a0Ralph Engelstad<\/a>. The late casino magnate, who spent\u00a0$110 million to build the venue<\/a>, hosted \u201cHitler birthday parties<\/a>\u201d and opposed the retirement of the \u201cfighting Sioux<\/a>\u201d as the school\u2019s official athletic mascot.<\/p>\n The\u00a0University of Missouri<\/a>\u00a0still has an endowed economics chair named for\u00a0Kenneth L. Lay<\/a>, the disgraced founder of the Enron energy company. Lay gave the school $1.1 million in Enron stock in 1999, two years before the company went bankrupt and seven years before he was found\u00a0guilty of securities fraud<\/a>\u00a0and other misdeeds.<\/p>\n Seton Hall University<\/a>, however, managed to reach agreement with donor\u00a0Dennis Kozlowski<\/a>, a former CEO convicted of pilfering money from the company he ran. The school\u00a0kept his gift but purged<\/a>\u00a0Kozlowski\u2019s name from campus buildings.<\/p>\n A more creative solution that I support as an ethicist is redirecting funds to research relevant to the donor\u2019s crime or misbehavior once misdeeds are discovered.<\/p>\n Imagine if every school that took donations from Jeffrey Epstein were to funnel that same amount of money into research on the prevention of sex trafficking and treatment of pedophilia. That boost might bring about social change.<\/p>\n Brown University<\/a>\u00a0is already doing this by redirecting Sackler donations to off-campus opioid addiction treatment centers. And the\u00a0University of Connecticut<\/a>\u00a0is using some donations it accepted from the Sacklers to fund addiction research and education.<\/p>\n I believe that any decision to redirect donor dollars should adhere to institutional messages and show that administrators have heard their stakeholders\u2019 concerns.<\/p>\n When schools allow major donors to name buildings, programs or new wings of hospitals or museums, the question of what they might want to do in the face of\u00a0misconduct by the donor<\/a>\u00a0rarely comes up. Neglecting that discussion may limit what can be done after the fact.<\/p>\n With no escape hatch written into gift agreements, as could be\u00a0mandated by policies<\/a>, the only way to take donors\u2019 names down is often by repaying them or their heirs. Adjusted for inflation, these repayments can be quite expensive.<\/p>\n The\u00a0Catholic University of America<\/a>\u2019s gift acceptance policy is a good model. It tells donors their naming rights may be revoked if the school \u201cdetermines that its association with the donor will materially damage the reputation of the University.\u201d\u00a0Carnegie Mellon University<\/a>\u00a0has adopted this language, too.<\/p>\n Whether intended or not, the choices university presidents and other campus leaders make, or fail to make, speak to their school\u2019s character and integrity. Bringing students into the discussion is likely to result in policies and responses that are consistent with the school\u2019s values and with\u00a0the whole point of higher education<\/a>.<\/p>\nLofty values<\/strong><\/h4>\n
Engaged students<\/strong><\/h4>\n
Disgraced donors<\/strong><\/h4>\n
Escape hatches<\/strong><\/h4>\n