by Nathan Baca
Staff Writer
After a slow start, the University of La Verne’s endowment fund is reported to be at a healthy level by ULV Treasurer Avo Kechichian.
The investment fund, worth $30.5 million as of last June, exists as a financial reserve for the University.
Though the endowment is not used for the daily operating expenses of the campus, its effects are felt on the lives of students are measured in the numerous scholarships that are funded from the 5 percent allocated from the investment profits.
The new strength of the endowment is not linked to the 4.5 percent annual undergraduate tuition increase instated last year since there is “no correlation” said Executive Vice President Philip Hawkey.
“Our endowment fund is managed by five stock broker firms that invest in different stocks,” said Kechichian. “It [the endowment] goes by how the market goes.”
The recent cool-down of the stock market indexes have decreased the previous annual increase of the endowment from nearly 12 percent to 8 percent.
The endowment owes much of its fortune to the efforts of ULV President Stephen Morgan shortly after his inauguration, said Hawkey.
A joint campaign by Morgan and University Relations made an active effort to court alumni and donors to bolster the principal of the small account.
Despite these efforts, the size of the ULV endowment is below the level of some of the neighboring colleges. Due to investment strategies that are nearly a century old, Claremont McKenna College, for example, boasts a sizeable $750 million while Pomona College’s endowment is figured to be $1 billion.
