The U.S. News Short List, separate from our overall rankings, is a regular series that magnifies individual data points in hopes of providing students and parents a way to find which undergraduate or graduate programs excel or have room to grow in specific areas. Be sure to explore The Short List: College, The Short List: Grad School and The Short List: Online Programs to find data that matter to you in your college or graduate school search.
There’s almost no better way for college grads to thank their alma maters than by writing a check.
At many schools, alumni donations fund scholarships, start new programs and help maintain campus facilities.
And graduates are getting more generous. Alumni donations increased 9.4 percent in 2014, according to the Council for Aid to Education.
Graduates from some historically black colleges and universities give more than others.
At Claflin University, for example, an average of 48.9 percent of alumni donated during the 2012-2013 and 2013-2014 school years. It had the highest percentage of alumni who donated among 46 historically black schools that submitted data to U.S. News in an annual survey.
Claflin has also topped this list in the past, but some new schools have joined the top 10.
Bennett College, an all-women’s school, is right behind Claflin with an average of 38.2 percent of alumni who donated during a two-year period. Fisk University, where NAACP co-founder W.E.B. Du Bois attended, had an average of 23.9 percent of alumni who donated.
At a few of these schools, hardly any graduates donated during the 2012-2013 and 2013-2014 period. At Texas Southern University , an average of 2 percent of alumni donated.
Below are the 10 historically black colleges and universities with the highest percentage of alumni who donated in 2012-2013 and 2013-2014. Unranked schools, which did not meet certain criteria required by U.S. News to be numerically ranked, were not considered for this report.
| School name (state) | Average percentage of alumni who donated | U.S. News historically black colleges and universities rank |
|---|---|---|
| Claflin University (SC) | 48.9% | 8 |
| Bennett College (NC) | 38.2% | 15 |
| Spelman College (GA) | 37.4% | 1 |
| Tuskegee University (AL) | 25.1% | 5 |
| Fisk University (TN) | 23.9% | 7 |
| Livingstone College (NC) | 23.8% | RNP* |
| Johnson C. Smith University (NC) | 16.3% | 16 |
| Tougaloo College (MS) | 16% | 11 |
| Morehouse College (GA) | 15.5% | 4 |
| Fort Valley State University (GA) | 14.4% | 39 (tie) |
*RNP denotes an institution that is ranked in the bottom one-fourth of its ranking category. U.S. News calculates a rank for the school but has decided not to publish it.
Don’t see your school in the top 10? Access the U.S. News College Compass to find alumni giving data, complete rankings and much more. School officials can access historical data and rankings, including of peer institutions, via U.S. News Academic Insights.
U.S. News surveyed nearly 1,800 colleges and universities for our 2015 survey of undergraduate programs. Schools self-reported myriad data regarding their academic programs and the makeup of their student body, among other areas, making U.S. News’ data the most accurate and detailed collection of college facts and figures of its kind. While U.S. News uses much of this survey data to rank schools for our annual Best Colleges rankings, the data can also be useful when examined on a smaller scale. U.S. News will now produce lists of data, separate from the overall rankings, meant to provide students and parents a means to find which schools excel, or have room to grow, in specific areas that are important to them. While the data come from the schools themselves, these lists are not related to, and have no influence over, U.S. News’ rankings of Best Colleges, Best Graduate Schools or Best Online Programs. The alumni giving data above are correct as of Nov. 10, 2015.
Delece Smith-Barrow is an education reporter at U.S. News, covering college admissions; she previously wrote about graduate schools. You can follow her on Twitter or email her at dsmithbarrow@usnews.com.
