BusinessTN

When evaluating the health of a university, it's always instructive to take a look at the institution's endowment. One look at Fisk's minuscule endowment of $7.7 million is all it takes to get a sobering dose of reality. While $7.7 million represents a sizeable sum for the average individual, it's a drop in the bucket in the world of higher education. In 2007, behemoths like Harvard and Yale reported endowments north of $34.6 billion and $22.5 billion, respectively, according to a study conducted by the National Association of College and University Business Officers. One of Fisk's Nashville neighbors, Vanderbilt University, boasts about $3.5 billion. Another neighbor, Belmont University, is downright skinny in comparison, weighing in at a more modest $61 million. Still, not only is that figure eight times that of Fisk's, Belmont has also spent much more than that during the last decade--the Gordon E. Inman Center, Thrailkill Hall dormitory, Curb Event Center, etc.--in a burst of building activity Fisk can only envy.

Though such comparisons provide useful context, Fisk President Hazel O'Leary points to a more direct competitor group when sizing up endowments. In U.S. News and World Report's 2009 ranking of HBCUs, Fisk comes in at #5 behind Spelman, Howard, Morehouse and Hampton--which boast endowments between $100 million and $600 million. That, O'Leary says, means Fisk needs an endowment of at least $100 million to truly compete with the top four HBCUs, as well as smaller, principally white colleges out there.

To consume this particular elephant, O'Leary is going with a one-bite-at-a-time approach. The plan, O'Leary says, is to raise at least $8 million a year until the launch of a 2012 capital campaign. The campaign's goal, then, will be to rebuild the endowment to increase the amount of institutional scholarship support for academically talented students. In the meantime, Fisk has begun to refill the endowment by what O'Leary calls "modest proportions," about $50,000 a year. In addition, a $20 million "Fisk Forever" scholarship initiative is currently in the silent phase to raise money for Fisk's "neediest of needy" kids.

Fisk's success or failure in rebuilding its endowment will be one of the many ways observers and insiders alike gauge the university's recovery in coming years.