#GivingTuesday ups Northern Foundation end-of-year drive

A #GivingTuesday donation drive has prompted a spike in giving to the Montana State University-Northern Alumni Foundation, its executive director said.

Director Jim Bennett said Thursday that more than $25,000 has been donated since Nov. 29 when the drive got underway. He said that he was unable to give an exact figure because donations were still coming in.

“Some people elected to make donations online, and some people have been responding through the mail, so there are some people still responding in that way,” Bennett said. “So it’s been great.”

Bennett said when fundraising letters and other marketing materials are sent out, the Foundation is able to track how people respond and they have responded well to this latest appeal.

The Alumni Foundation raises money from Northern alumni and others to assist students with the cost of college, provide scholarships, put on campus events, make upgrades to campus facilities and help Northern meet its strategic objectives.

Bennett said that like many organizations, the Foundation usually has an end-of-the-year fundraising push as people look to donate to organizations for tax purposes.

This year, the drive was scheduled on #GivingTuesday, a global social media campaign aimed at encouraging charitable giving the first Tuesday after Thanksgiving. The official website for #GivingTuesday says the annual event began in 2012.

“Instead of shopping on Black Friday or going onto Amazon [.com] on cyber Monday, some people are choosing to make a contribution in the name of a family member on #Giving Tuesday, and we hope that we will continue to have the sort of success we had this year.”

Bennett said donors can either direct their contribution to a specific campus program, or have it placed in the Foundation’s Excellence Fund, where the Foundation decides how to use the money.

“So some people have donated to scholarships or to a specific program that they were studying when they were students at Northern,” he said. “People have given to athletics, and we do have an unrestricted fund as well there are really a variety of things people can donate to.”

Numbers provided by Bennett late Thursday show that so far 65 percent of donations have gone to the campus’ Excellence Fund, another 20 percent to the foundation’s scholarship fund, 10 percent to Northern’s new Diesel Technology Center and 5 percent to a variety of other programs.

No date has been set for when the drive will end.

“It’s up to the people who are donating,” Bennett said.

He said people who want to donate can call the Foundation office at 265-3711 or give online at northernalumnifoundation.org.