Response to Congressional Endowment Inquiry
April 1, 2016
The Honorable Orrin Hatch, Chairman
Senate Committee on Finance
219 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
The Honorable Kevin Brady, Chairman, House Committee on Ways and Means
The Honorable Peter J. Roskam, Chairman, House Oversight Subcommittee
1102 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Dear Chairmen Hatch, Brady, and Roskam:
On behalf of Boston University, I am pleased to provide responses to the questions presented in your letter of February 8, 2016.
Boston University is the nation’s fourth largest private university in student enrollment, with 33,000 undergraduate and graduate students from 130 countries. The University has 17 schools and colleges offering over 250 fields of study.
From our founding as a small Methodist seminary in 1839 to our present day as a global institution, Boston University has been committed to providing talented students from all economic backgrounds access to our extraordinary academic programs and resources. For the fiscal year ended June 30, 2015, the University provided more than $326 million in financial aid, fellowships, and other support to help our undergraduate and graduate students pay for a BU education.
As we work to raise the quality of our educational and research programs and to continue to increase student diversity and improve affordability, building the endowment as a strong, stable, and growing component of our financial structure is and will continue to be a priority. Because we are chartered as a charitable entity to serve purposes that transcend generations, we have developed investment policies that maintain intergenerational equity by benefitting current and future students equally.
In the attached materials we describe in detail our approach to managing our investment assets to fulfill our mission and how we abide by donor restrictions, relevant state and federal regulations, and current best accounting practices as they apply to institutions of higher education.
I trust that the attached responses to your specific questions and related attachments will be helpful and responsive to your request. Should you require clarification, please do not hesitate to contact me or General Counsel Erika Geetter at 617-353-2326.
Sincerely,
Robert A. Brown
President