Endowed Gifts

Each year we rely on your generous support, along with the gifts of many others, to help us carry out our work. Endowment funds not only make a lasting impact at Cal Poly, they also offer the opportunity to honor your family name or pay tribute to a loved one. You can establish an endowment with a contribution of cash, securities, real estate or a planned gift.

How It Works

When you make an endowed gift, your contribution is invested with and becomes part of our endowment. An annual distribution is made for the purpose you designate. Because the principal remains intact the fund will generate support in perpetuity.

Did you know?

You can set up an honorary endowment in your will so that your name, or the name of someone special, can live on forever.

Endowments provide a consistent flow of support to students and allow the university to plan into the future. Minimum gift levels to create various types of endowments have been set to guarantee that income will be adequate to achieve the benefactor's vision, both now and in the future. Gifts of any size may be added later to enlarge the endowment over time. Gifts at the following levels can create permanent named endowments at Cal Poly:

Based on the Cal Poly Foundation's spending policy, the Foundation currently distributes 4.00 percent of the three-year rolling average in the fund. Any additional returns above this amount are reinvested into the fund to allow the fund to defeat inflation over time.

In order to have a full year of earnings available, endowments at required threshold must be invested no less than twelve consecutive months prior to the first distribution of earnings. Some donors choose to also contribute a direct cash gift to cover scholarships or award until the endowment is fully funded and distributing proceeds.

Learn about our current endowment investment policy (PDF)