A number of well endowed universities have recently been criticized for harboring endowments in the billions of dollars, but not providing enough scholarship money to students.
Today, the NY Times ran an article about how many university endowments contain funds that are even more restricted by the donors. Some of the gifts are downright quirky and create problems in using the funds for other purposes.
All of this, plus a shaky economy, is enough to scare some nonprofits away from setting up their own endowments. But, since setting up an endowment is a long-term effort, nonprofit organizations should not hesitate to start putting the bricks in place for an endowment that can bring stability, diversification in funding, and options to donors.
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