End of the Academic Year Updates
The spring semester brought a busy and exciting end to the academic year at Skidmore, capped by our 107th Commencement Exercises on May 19. We also completed the launch of a new website, the enrollment of a new class and made major strides along our path to completing the Creating Our Future: Campaign for Skidmore.
We have many accomplishments to celebrate and much to look forward to in the coming year.
As we reflect on the excitement of Commencement, it's my pleasure to also share that the parents and families of our graduating seniors donated an astounding $1.3 million to the annual Parents Fund—a new record. Not to be outdone, the Class of 2018 also set a new record for Senior Gift with a 94.9 percent participation rate.
We recognized the support given by mentors to the members of the graduating class in our first annual Stoles and Cords Ceremony. This wonderful event was a special opportunity for us to gather and celebrate our graduates, their many achievements and diversity at Skidmore. Graduates publicly acknowledged their mentors including faculty, staff, peers and family who, in turn, had the honor of placing stoles representing ethnic heritage, first-generation status, LGBTQ+ status and international origin.
We received final enrollments for the Class of 2022. We anticipate that 650 students will join us on campus in the fall and 36 students will spend their first semester in London as part of our marquee first-year experience program there.
However, enrolling this new class has resulted in an increase of nearly $1.2 million in financial aid required over last year, which will have an impact on our planning that we must confront. For one, these increased costs remain through the four years of study for the class—not just the fiscal year ahead.
We also recognize that this is not a trend unique to Skidmore and, like many institutions, we will need to plan for ways to continue recruiting the best students while recognizing that not all or even the majority of families have the ability to pay for a top-notch liberal arts education.
Certainly, we will rise to meet the challenge ahead as we always have, but above all else, it is our ability to raise the reputation and national profile of Skidmore that will continue to attract and recruit the very best and brightest students.
Looking ahead to the goals we have set as part of Creating Our Future: The Campaign for Skidmore, I am pleased to share that we are outpacing our fundraising efforts from last year and are well on our way to hitting the targets we set for 2020. We received more than $28 million in new commitments to the Campaign this year, with $5.2 million of those coming from parents, a 25 percent increase over the prior year. We are close to achieving $160 million in funds raised toward the $200 million goal, and we have recorded an uptick in alumni participation rate to 19.5 percent.
I am pleased to announce to the Skidmore community that we will have a fall Campaign launch event on campus in October. While we are still finalizing a date and location, this type of event seems to be a specialty of ours in many ways, and a similar event during the last campaign resulted in a 78 percent participation rate. It is my hope that we will continue this industry-leading trend and band together to ensure the future we have envisioned for Skidmore.
Finally, I wish to recognize several individuals who, after a combined service of more than 50 years, will leave the college to embrace a well-deserved retirement. Chief Human Resources Officer Barbara Beck, Vice President of Finance and Administration Mike West and Dean of Special Programs Paul Calhoun have my appreciation and applause for many, many contributions to Skidmore through their respective tenures. In addition, we must also highlight the excellent work of Crystal Dea Moore, who has served as the interim dean of the faculty and will continue to do so until the arrival of Michael Orr this summer.
To all of you in the Skidmore campus community and beyond, I wish you a restful and
enjoyable summer and eagerly await the start of our 2018 fall semester.
Sincerely,
Philip A. Glotzbach