“The motivation for President Miller and for those who work in Development is to continue to improve Hamline for our students,” said Vice President Tony Grundhauser when being asked about the reason behind the comprehensive campaign and how it will benefit students.

Grundhauser and the Development Office have two main priorities in this campaign that will not only benefit the University but for those who attend Hamline.

According to Grundhauser, their priority in the comprehensive campaign is to create 100 new named scholarships by 2020 and have more ability to provide financial aid to students. Their second priority is to focus on increasing the membership in the Heritage Society—people who make Hamline a part of their estate plans whether they write Hamline into their will, or set up some sort of trust.

“Currently, we have over 400 living members in that club and we want to increase that to 500 in over the next two years. We are talking to people about their estate plans including Hamline and their estate plans, of course, those are gifts that come to us after they passed.” Grundhauser said. “We want to build on that because that’s a great source of future revenue for our university. It’s a great way for people to support the University.”

On the other hand, after discussing the priorities of the campaign with President Miller, she states that the Board and herself had agreed that Hamline should develop a comprehensive campaign, although no decisions yet have been made about the campaign priorities.

“That said, the biggest beneficiary in any comprehensive campaign is students—in terms of endowed scholarships, support of existing or new programs—both academic and student life-oriented,” said Miller.

Miller along with Grundhauser, the Athletic Director, Dean of Student Affairs and the Deans, have been working on the comprehensive campaign to allow Hamline to grow and excel.

Grundhauser explains that in this campaign, the number one thing that will benefit students is the scholarships and the ability to provide financial aid to their students. He explains that because of this campaign, the endowment funds have supported a major or funded several programs.

“Anytime we can raise more money for the University, that helps students too,” Grundhauser said. “It helps reduce the pressure on other kinds of revenue that come to us.”

Through the comprehensive campaign, Miller and the Development Office’s main goal is to raise money for the endowment, current gifts, annual funds, and possibly, “some capital or renovation projects.”

“There are no new buildings on the docket right now, we will be looking at money and how we can raise money for renovations projects,” Grundhauser said.

During the time of the 150th anniversary celebration at Hamline, Miller and the Development Office did the campaign for the Anderson Center and raised over $20 million to build it.

As stated by Grundhauser, “we are spending the next couple months talking to some of our largest donors about where they are at, what they are thinking, if they can see themselves gifting endow scholarships and making a big commitment towards it for 5-7 years.”

Both Miller and Grundhauser have informed that there is no additional information about what students should know in regards to the comprehensive campaign. The theme of the campaign and the targeted amount have yet to be set.

The comprehensive campaign is in “the feasibility stage at this point in the process. No events have been planned nor has a campaign rationale been fully developed or a case statement written” according to Miller.

“A lot of times in these campaigns, we plan them to take place in over the five to seven years, the first couple years a lot of times they’re called the ‘silent phase’ so they are not big public kinds of things,” Grundhauser said. “It’s usually at the end of the campaign. That means we are talking to people individually, typically those who make the largest gifts. Once we have those secured we go public all about it.”