Endowments

Types of Endowed Funds

Deanships

Endowed deanships enable the University to attract and recognize distinguished faculty who contribute to the academic rigor of the institution and help shape its future.

Professorships

Endowed professorships provide permanent sources of support for faculty excellence. With their prestige and financial rewards, endowed chairs recognize scholars’ achievements and enhance their professional standing throughout the academic world.

Scholarships

Endowed scholarships help ensure that a UVA education is affordable for all undergraduate students regardless of their means. While financial aid from state and federal sources meets some of this need, donor-funded scholarships ensure that all qualified students have the opportunity to attend the University. Scholarships attract prospective students who in turn add significantly to the quality of life at the University.

Graduate Fellowships

Endowed fellowships enable the University to recruit outstanding graduate students, who are essential to the intellectual life of the institution. Graduate students pursue their own projects and assist faculty in their research and scholarship. They also play a critical role in undergraduate education, teaching basic and introductory courses and leading small discussion sections for large survey classes.

Faculty Funds for Excellence

Faculty funds for excellence allow schools to nurture faculty research, support new initiatives, create new courses and more. An endowed, named research fund may support faculty engaged in humanities scholarship or in research needed for discoveries in the hard and social sciences, including medicine and engineering. This support is vital for professors to fulfill their roles as scholars, researchers, and teachers.

Lectureships

Endowed lectureships generate funds to bring distinguished speakers to the University’s Grounds, enriching academic discourse and exposing students, faculty, and the larger community to new perspectives.

Research Funds

Research funds support faculty engaged in humanities scholarship, or the research needed for new discoveries in science, medicine, or engineering.

Library Funds

Library funds help the University Library pursue pioneering initiatives in digital scholarship while continuing to purchase ever-more-expensive books and journals.

Centers, Institutes, Departments, and Programs

There are many opportunities to support the University’s various centers, institutes, departments, and programs. They may be named by a donor who contributes an endowment that generates at least half of the entity’s projected operating costs.

Memorial or Commemorative Funds

Memorial or commemorative endowed gift funds can be meaningful ways to honor friends, family members, or favorite professors.

Prizes and Awards

Prizes and awards are tangible expressions of the University’s values that also recognize distinguished contributions by faculty, staff, and students.

Unrestricted Funding

At a minimum level of $100,000, a donor may designate an endowed gift to support the school, program, or initiative of his or her choice, to be used by the designee when and where needed.

Sound Investment, Strong Growth

Your endowed gift is a vital investment in UVA. The University of Virginia’s strong endowment has been a critical asset in expanding UVA’s programs and launching new initiatives. An effective long-term investment strategy helps maintain the endowment’s value over time, and provides a steady and growing stream of income essential to funding teaching, scholarships, research, and world-class patient care.

Growth of $1 in Long Term Pool vs. Passive Alternatives

Investment Vehicle	UVIMCO Long Term PooL	Policy Benchmark	S&P 500
2001	1.00	1.00	1.00
2002	1.00	0.94	0.82
2003	1.09	0.96	0.82
2004	1.23	1.13	0.98
2005	1.40	1.27	1.04
2006	1.61	1.44	1.13
2007	2.01	1.71	1.36
2008	2.13	1.62	1.19
2009	1.69	1.30	0.87
2010	1.94	1.47	1.00
2011	2.41	1.80	1.31
2012	2.54	1.80	1.38
2013	2.88	2.00	1.66
2014	3.42	2.33	2.07
2015	3.69	2.38	2.23
2016	3.63	2.42	2.31
2017	4.08	2.70	2.73
2018	4.55	2.90	3.12
2019	4.81	3.13	3.45
2020	5.07	3.23	3.71
2021	7.55	4.18	5.22

Thanks to the expert management of the University of Virginia Management Company (UVIMCO), endowed gifts provide a crucial source of sustainable funding for UVA and its mission. UVIMCO invests endowed funds in a Long Term Pool, which is custom managed for the endowment spending requirements and UVA’s risk profile. Through effective active management, the Long Term Pool is carefully designed to generate a substantial and growing stream of income to support the University’s future financial stability, and fund priorities like student aid, teaching and research, and other initiatives.

Over the last 3-, 5-, and 10-year periods, ending June 30, 2022, UVIMCO’s Long Term Pool generated annualized returns of 14.4%, 12%, and 11%, respectively. The previous fiscal year, as noted in the UVIMCO 2021 annual report and marked by a return of 49%, represented a single, highly unusual point in time, and UVIMCO's investment over the past few decades is what really matters. UVIMCO's long-term returns remain strong.

Growth of a Gift

See what an endowed gift made twenty years ago would be worth today.

The chart below shows the growth of an endowed gift invested in UVIMCO’s Long Term Pool.

Gift Size	$100,000	$250,000	$500,000	$1,000,000
2001	100000	250000	500000	1000000
2002	99910	249775	499550	999100
2003	109060	272650	545301	1090602
2004	122885	307212	614425	1228850
2005	140438	351097	702194	1404388
2006	160874	402186	804372	1608745
2007	201467	503668	1007337	2014674
2008	213421	533554	1067109	2134219
2009	168631	421578	843156	1686313
2010	194138	485345	970690	1941381
2011	241299	603249	1206499	2412999
2012	253628	634071	1268142	2536284
2013	287650	719125	1438250	2876501
2014	342312	855781	1711562	3423125
2015	368783	921958	1843916	3687832
2016	363095	907738	1815477	3630955
2017	408196	1020490	2040981	4081963
2018	454575	1136439	2272878	4545756
2019	480965	1202413	2404827	4809655
2020	506614	1266536	2533072	5066144
2021	755073	1887684	3775369	7550739

Your gift of $100,000 creates a faculty research fund

Your gift of $500,000 creates a bicentennial scholarship

Your gift of $1,000,000 renovates a Lawn Room

Endowments in Action

Jeffersonian Grounds

UVA's Gentle Giants

Poets and presidents have called the Lawn home. But none have stood quite so tall or served so long or selflessly as the trees of the historic Jeffersonian Grounds.