Pitzer's Endowment

The endowment provides important financial resources that support the College’s ability to deliver an excellent and distinctive liberal arts education to both current and future students. The endowment contributes to student financial aid, faculty and staff compensation, and all other College operating expenses.

To balance the College’s commitment to both current and future generations of Pitzer students, annual spending from the endowment is governed by a spending rate policy determined by the Board of Trustees. Currently, the policy permits annual distribution of 4.0% to 4.5% of the endowment’s average value over the previous 16 fiscal quarters.

Each $1 million in Pitzer’s endowment provides at least $40,000 in operating budget support each year. If the College were to take additional money from the endowment to pay for a one-time need now, it would require an immediate replacement of operating revenues from other sources, now and every year moving forward.

No. Funds collected from students and families, such as tuition and fees, do not go into the endowment and are used solely to support current College operations.

For a discussion of this, see Responsible Investing.

For the portion of the endowment allocated to publicly traded stocks, Pitzer invests in a fund, alongside other institutional investors, that is managed by BlackRock, a leading asset management firm. The fund seeks to track a specific stock index that is constructed and maintained by MSCI—the MSCI ACWI ex Fossil Fuels ESG Focus index. 

The MSCI index is composed of thousands of stocks from around the world, from which BlackRock selects a representative sample numbering in the hundreds of stocks. As discussed more fully in the Responsible Investing section of this site, MSCI considers environmental, social, and governance (ESG) factors in constructing the index. Additionally, the index excludes the stocks of fossil fuel producers. Pitzer does not determine either the companies in the index or the specific stocks BlackRock selects in managing the fund. 

Disclosure of the individual stock holdings that comprise the index and the fund is prohibited under contractual arrangement between BlackRock, MSCI, and the fund’s investors (including Pitzer). More details about the index and the fund’s holdings may be found in the Responsible Investing section of this site.
 

An index fund is a special kind of mutual fund. An explanation of mutual funds can be found here. An explanation of index funds can be found here.

Pitzer discloses additional information on the endowment annually in the footnotes of our annual financial statements

Senior staff from the Treasurer’s office often speak with stakeholder groups including donors, faculty, and staff regarding the management of the College’s endowment. If you are interested in arranging for one of these meetings, please send a request to treasurer@pitzer.edu.

Pitzer's annual financial statements covering more than a decade are available in our financial statements archive.

Budget Questions: If you have further questions about Pitzer College's finances or endowment, please email treasurer@pitzer.edu.

Donor Questions: For questions about donations, please email PitzerAdvancement@pitzer.edu.