The Corporate Alumnus Program: A New Plan for College Giving

by PHILIP D. REED

Chairman of the Trustees

General Electric Educational and Charitable Fund

On November 15, 1954 the Trustees of the General Electric Educational and Charitable Fund established, for the year 1955, a new program of financial aid to colleges and universities.

It is called the Corporate Alumnus Program because, under its provisions, the Fund joins with employees of General Electric in the support of the colleges and universities at which these employees received their degrees. Within the limits of the plan, gifts will be made from the Fund in amounts equal to those made by any individual employee-alumnus.

The Colleges Need More Help

Up to now, the pattern of corporate assistance to higher education has been fairly well established. In the case of General Electric, it has taken the forms of gifts and endowments, grants-in-aid, equipment for instructional purposes, scholarships, graduate fellowships, and various kinds of coöperative undertakings. The long-range objectives of these programs have been the fostering of an adequate supply of educated manpower and the maintenance and improvement of an economic and social climate in which General Electric can continue to do business, progress, and prosper.

Today, America’s colleges and universities need increased support. Their costs are higher; their enrollments are higher and will become higher still as larger proportions of an increasing youth population turn to them for general education and professional training. Physical plants are inadequate; teaching staffs are overtaxed and all too often underpaid.

These conditions exist in the face of mounting needs for more educated manpower — and more talented manpower — on the part of business, research, the professions, and government. Our free economy and society depend upon the educational process for survival and growth. American business and industry have, then, ample reason as good corporate citizens to want to help maintain the financial soundness and continued growth of these educational institutions. One form this support can take is a program of regular, systematic giving.

The Corporate Alumnus

It is not easy to work out an equitable, positive pattern for corporate giving. Should it, for example, give special emphasis to nearby colleges, or honorary degrees to company officers, or curricula tailored to fit a company’s recruiting needs? Should it take into account the giving habits of its employee alumni? The characteristics of the company will be a determining factor.

For General Electric, there are no “local” colleges, since it has plants in half the 48 states, and places of business in all of them. It is one of the nation’s largest employers of college-trained personnel, outside of government, with upwards of 23,000 holders of degrees from more than 500 colleges and universities. More than 70 per cent of these college people have technical or engineering degrees, yet in most recent years close to 45 per cent hired have been non-technical.

A satisfactory program will share responsibility with those who benefit most. The immediate beneficiary of American higher education is the educated individual, and then through him the organization of which he is a part. Therefore it has seemed appropriate and fair that both the individual alumnus and the employing organization should join in a giving plan. The Corporate Alumnus Program, initiated by the General Electric Educational and Charitable Fund, a fund created by the General Electric Company, was devised to implement such a joint effort.

Rules of the Corporate Alumnus Program

Here, in official language, are the rules for the Program established by the Trustees: —

The Corporate Alumnus Program provides that the General Electric Educational and Charitable Fund will contribute to any college or university an amount equal to the amount of any contribution, or the total of any contributions, made during the calendar year 1955 and prior to December 15 of that year to the college or university by a General Electric employee who holds an earned degree from that institution, subject to the following conditions:

1. The employee’s contribution, in order to qualify under this Program, must be the personal gift of the employee actually paid to the college or university during the calendar year 1955 and prior to December 15 of that year in cash or in securities having a quoted market value and not merely a pledge.

2. The college or university to qualify must be a four-year course, degree-granting institution, accredited by the appropriate regional or professional accrediting association and located within the United States or its possessions.

3. Contributions under the Program shall be employed by the college or university to realize or foster the primary needs and objectives of an institution of higher education, namely, of augmenting the required capital and general operating funds, of providing for expanded student enrollment, of strengthening educational facilities and curricula, and of improving incentives for the highest quality of teaching.

4. The employee at the time of his or her contribution shall be in the active regular employment of the General Electric Company or one of its wholly-owned subsidiaries and shall have had at least one year of continuous service in such employment.

5. The total contribution under this Program with respect to the contribution or contributions of any individual employee shall be limited to the sum of $1000 and the total contributions to be made by the Fund under the Program shall not exceed the amount appropriated by the Trustees of the Fund for this purpose. In the event that total employee contributions otherwise coming within the terms of this Program exceed the amount so appropriated by the Trustees, the contributions to be made by the Fund under this Program may be apportioned by the Trustees in such manner as they may consider equitable and proper.

6. The Trustees shall be entitled, if they deem it desirable to do so, to suspend, revoke, or terminate this Program at any time with respect to employee contributions thereafter made.

7. Any question, whether as to the interpretation, application, or administration of the provisions of this Program or otherwise, shall be determined by the Trustees and their decision shall be final.

What Will the Program Accomplish?

The Trustees hope that this new program will stimulate colleges and universities to work harder to obtain the support of their alumni. They hope, also, that other companies may find in this idea a pattern appropriate to their own educational programs. It is not competitive, since each company’s employees are exclusively its own. If it were to be widely adopted, there are few colleges in America that would not benefit by increased alumni giving and by corporate support from some segments of industry.

The corporate alumnus concept, as far as General Electric knows, is new. Its full success cannot be measured until the end of 1955, so there is very little more information that can now be given about it. But experience gained in the course of the Program will be made available to others who are sincerely interested in similar aid to higher education. Inquiries may be addressed to: General Electric Educational and Charitable Fund, Corporate Alumnus Program, One River Road, Schenectady 5, New York.