Despite graduating as recently as 2012 and still struggling to pay off student loan debt, several new alumni report repeatedly being contacted by Boston University officials to donate to the school.
BU graduate Kara McGuire said she has received calls from BU employees every night around 7 p.m. for almost two weeks.
McGuire, who graduated from the College of Communication in 2012, said she does not answer the calls because she believes BU is soliciting her for donations.
“The way I see it, I’m still paying off my student loans,” she said. “It’s only been a year. Any spare money that I have is not going to be donated to the university at this point. Maybe somewhere farther along the line, I’ll try to do that, but right now I’m still making payments to the loan collection department at BU.”
Almost every month since she graduated, McGuire said she has received mail items from BU, reminding her what she donated last and how she can make donations to different programs and areas of the school.
“At this point, I don’t even open all of them [the mailings],” she said. “If I see something from the Alumni Association, I just choose to ignore it. I’m not going to be sending them a check any time soon.”
The university could benefit from scaling back its efforts to obtain donations from younger graduates, McGuire said.
“Even those of us [recent graduates] who are fortunate to get work — we’ve got bills to pay, and we’re pretty much all in debt,” she said. “They [BU officials] should know, with how much they charge for tuition.”
Vice President for Alumni Relations Steve Hall said student callers contact graduates annually for donations.
“Alumni are contacted in a variety of ways, dependent upon what may be the most effective way to discuss their philanthropic support,” Hall said in an email. “At the general level, most alumni receive letters, phone calls or emails asking for their support.”
BU contacts all graduates for gifts, Hall said. Alumni donations can be made to almost all areas of the school.
He said contributions made by alumni to BU are one of the reasons behind the university’s recent jump in the U.S. News and World Report national college rankings.
“In general, recent graduates are giving at a higher participation rate than other alumni,” Hall said. “This speaks to the experience students have while on campus and the value they place on their BU education.”
BU College of Arts and Sciences graduate Michelle Drapek, who completed her studies in 2010, said despite the controversy created by the recent mail from BU asking for donations, the university has realistic expectations of recent graduate students.
“Maybe they could have taken a little bit of a different direction on the ads, but I think that students also misunderstand the sentiment sometimes,” she said. “…They [BU officials] understand that it’s not the case that everybody’s in the place to give, but at the same time, I think that they want students to understand the importance of giving back.”
Drapek, who worked in Development and Alumni Relations at BU for two years after graduating, said while not every graduate is in a position to give, alumni donations are key for the university’s success.
“If you look around at some of the schools that have always had great programs and great reputations, it’s also because they have large endowments and a lot of alumni support,” she said. “It’s important for students to continue to stay engaged with BU.”
Matthew Rosenstein, who graduated from CAS in 2000, said he received a postcard from BU last week that stated “Give now and we won’t call you at dinner for a year” with the word “really” as a postscript.
While there is nothing wrong with BU asking graduates for donations, university officials have gone too far with this recent mailing campaign, Rosenstein said.
“On the surface, there’s nothing wrong with it [BU asking alumni for donations],” he said. “Of course, BU has to procure funding from a variety of different sources. It’s impossible for them to know any given student’s financial situation.”
Officials should also make more of an effort to show alumni what their donations can accomplish, Rosenstein said.
“BU is a wonderful place to go to school, but I wouldn’t know if my donation would support students and enrich academic programs, or [if] it would just go to some real estate deal to acquire more property or build new buildings,” Rosenstein said. “To reduce the solicitation of donations to a tweet-length postcard is kind of insulting, lacking in information and not very respectful.”
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