Frequently Asked Questions

Administers resources and best practices aligned with SPG 602.03 (Policy on Stewardship and Management of Gift Funds) to help units maintain compliance and minimize fiduciary risk.

Manages the Gift Fund Utilization Report in Tableau, which merges financial data with development data to help units track, analyze, and optimize gift fund usage. 

Facilitates a dedicated Community of Practice, monthly office hours, onboarding, and direct guidance for unit Gift Fund Captains and administrative teams.

Bridges connections between campus units, Financial Operations, the Shared Services Center, the Office of General Counsel, and others to streamline fund maintenance, amendments, and administration. 

 

Proactively review utilization reports to track fund activity, manage report access, and identify low or moderate utilization funds that need review.

Lead the process of investigating funds, assigning PG Review Indicators, and documenting actionable plans to demonstrate annual progress.

Ensure gift fund utilization processes and procedures are managed in accordance with SPG 602.03 and expenditures align with donor intent. This includes advising unit leadership on the utilization viability of new gifts prior to acceptance.

Serve as the primary subject matter expert within their SCCU, facilitating awareness, myth-busting misconceptions, and reporting progress to leadership.

Actively participate in the GFC Community of Practice to share insights, provide feedback to the central GFSM team, and adopt university-wide best practices.

To add a PGRI to a gift fund, GFSM support staff can use one of two methods, depending on volume and system access.

• • For Multiple Funds (Recommended) – Use the batch upload process. Download the PG Review Indicator excel template from the Office of University Development (OUD) Integrated Data Services site, complete the fund details (formatting Designation Lookup IDs with a trailing -P), and submit it via the OUD Help Desk.

• • For a Single Fund – If you have the DART Donor Intent role in OARS, log into DART, perform a Purpose Search for your fund, navigate to the Attributes tab, select PG Review Indicator, and enter the appropriate value, start date, and end date.

For complete instructions, and more information about the DART Donor Intent role, please refer to the Attributes section of our Maintain Gift Fund Data page

Three factors determine PG Utilization Rate:

• Ratio of Fiscal Year Beginning Balance to Average Income (5 Prior Year)
  • Goal of 3.0 or lower
• Ratio of Average Income (5 Prior Year) to Average Expense (5 Prior Year)
  • Goal of 3.0 or lower
• Months Since Last Expense
  • Goal of less than 18 months

For example, consider a PG with:

• FY Beginning Balance of $10,000
• Average 5 Prior Year Income of  $2,500
• Average 5 Prior Year Expense of $1,800
• Annual, routine expenses

Balance:Income Ratio ($10,000 / $2,500) = 4 ❌

Income:Expense Ratio ($2,500 / $1,800) = 1.39 ✅

Months Since Last Expense = 11 ✅

In this example, the PG would be measured as Moderate utilization. Because the values for Balance, Income, and Expense can only be determined once per fiscal year, most PGs only move to a new Utilization Rate once per year.

PGRIs are designed to provide time-bound structure to your strategic utilization plans.

The Core Objective During the Under Review Period

During the Under Review window, the goal is to make progress toward improved fund utilization—moving a PG from Low to Moderate or from Moderate to High utilization.

• Demonstrate Action – The assigned PGRI serves as a temporary indicator that an active management or spending plan is underway to align fund usage with donor intent.

Review Progress at Expiration

When the PGRI end date is reached, the spending authority and local GFSM support staff (such as your unit’s Gift Fund Captain) should collaboratively evaluate the fund’s status.

• Assess Financial Movement – Review the PG’s recent transaction activity, balance-to-income ratios, donor intent, and overall utilization rate to determine what progress was made over the review period.
• Evaluate Plan Viability – Determine whether the original strategic plan was successfully completed, needs adjustment, or requires additional time to achieve its goals.

Handling Special Cases

Some gift fund PGs naturally function as holding accounts (e.g., capital funds for multi-year projects, periodic 3–5 year initiatives, undesignated gift accounts, etc.) and may inherently remain at Low or Moderate utilization over longer periods of time.

• Reapplying a PGRI – In these situations—or if a plan requires extra time beyond the initial 3-year limit—units should re-evaluate the fund and assign a new PGRI (and updated start and end dates) that best reflects the current strategy and status of the PG.

The Initial Department ID is the Department to which the PG was first assigned and usually the Department in which the PG funds are received and spent, and typically does not change over time.

The General Ledger Department ID is the Department assigned to revenue and expense transactions. This can change over time or be split between multiple Departments.

When a PG’s revenue and expense transactions have been split over multiple General Ledger Department IDs, the PG will be listed multiple times in the PG Ratios Data Dump to reflect the different associated GL Department IDs.

Consolidating one or more gifts and/or distributions with like purposes can allow for ease of usage to reduce administrative burden while remaining true to donor intent.

The GFSM Executive Sponsors and Advisory Council have provided the following guidance to support an efficient resolution for low balance funds:

“An SCCU may move the balance of the PG to an expendable gift fund PG with the same or similar purpose;

OR,

if there is no similarly situated PG, then to the SCCU’s discretionary gift fund PG, if both of the following apply:

– The balance is under $100 [=$99.99 or less]; and

– No additional distributions to the fund are anticipated either through outright contributions or distributions from a companion endowment

Following the transfer of the balance, the S/C/C/U shall close the original PG.”

See the Maintain Gift Fund Data page for guidance on managing data related to this process.