Invest Better in Colgate
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Why This Matters in 60 Seconds
Endowments provide the lifeblood of universities — funding scholarships, faculty, and programs. The larger the endowment, the more attractive a university is to prospective students and faculty (all things equal). Colgate’s endowment growth has lagged that of peers for a decade, leaving the university with roughly $15 million less to spend each year, similar to what the Annual Fund raises each year or full tuition for ~200 students.
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The vast majority of endowment growth comes from investing, not fundraising.
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Colgate’s investment performance has trailed peers over the past decade, ranking ~86 of 123.
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Wesleyan is the proof: similar size and mission, had a smaller endowment than Colgate’s ten years ago. Today — without superior fundraising — it’s $300 million larger.
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This wasn’t luck: Wesleyan, like other well-performing peers, professionalized its endowment management in 2010. Colgate relies on unnamed volunteer board members.
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Colgate claims the endowment’s stagnant growth is due to more conservative management, but the evidence suggests otherwise — it fell similarly to a stock/bond index in 2008–2009.
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Disclosure is poor — well short of what leading peers provide.
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The ask: add your name to the petition. Step one is transparency — tell us how the endowment is performing with appropriate peer comparisons, bios of the investment staff and identities of the board’s investment committee. Better results start there.
My name is Mark Sommer, Class of '82. I spent 27 years at Fidelity Investments, mostly as a fund manager. I want to raise serious concerns about Colgate’s endowment management. Colgate hasn't posted endowment performance on its website since 2021, leaving stakeholders in the dark about how their endowment is being managed. An independent source shows Colgate’s cumulative performance over the prior decade ranks 73rd of 119 large endowments ($1 billion or more) at the end of fiscal 2024. In 2025, they quit this ranking service, in which they had participated for years. Colgate selectively published its 2025 return in their 2026 President's Report, confirming further deterioration into the bottom third of the short and long-term rankings. The university spins a narrative of “conservative management” rather than confronting its dismal investment performance.
By contrast, Wesleyan University — similar to Colgate in size, mission, and historical investment approach — ranked 9th among the same 119 schools. Under Anne Martin (recruited from Yale, a pioneer in endowment management), Wesleyan’s endowment went from being $50 million smaller than Colgate's in 2015 to $300 million larger in 2025, a $350 million swing due to superior investment performance. The top performers are dominated by universities that sought professional management.
Put differently: investing, more than fundraising, determines what a university can afford. Over the past decade, more than 75% of endowment growth at both schools came from investments — yet Wesleyan's investment gains surpassed Colgate's by $330M. Both schools spend close to 5% of endowment annually, a significant contributor to each university's operational budget. Had Colgate matched Wesleyan's investment returns, it could have allocated roughly $15 million more in 2025 to scholarships and programs — an amount comparable to Colgate's Total Annual [Fund] Giving (President's Report, p.13). Imagine where Colgate will be in 2036 if investments continue to lag.
Wesleyan shows what's possible when endowment management is done right: its ten-member professional investment team publishes a comprehensive annual letter detailing performance, including sub‑asset class returns, and publicly names its investment committee. Colgate, by contrast, discloses very little about its investments and performance, and won't reveal who's on the board's investment committee. The bottom line: Colgate follows an alternatives‑heavy strategy lacking demonstrated expertise, putting them in the bottom third of the rankings. Here's the irony: a low-cost indexing strategy would have put Colgate in the top quartile over the past decade.
Please join me in calling for better endowment management, disclosure, and governance. Colgate's Third Century Campaign alone is unlikely to close the growing endowment gaps with peers. Review Colgate's response to these concerns and the information below, and sign the PETITION, joining many fellow alumni.
Colgate's Endowment Returns for 6 past years:
2020 4.2% Not reported
2021 35.8% Posted on website until 2025
2022 -3.5% Not reported
2023 3.6% Not reported
2024 7.3% Not reported
2025 9.7% Reported in President's Report Only
~95% of the $350M swing is attributable to superior investing, based on Colgate's and Wesleyan's 990 Schedule D filings (2016–2024) and 2025 financials and estimates.
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PATHS FORWARD
The real question isn’t whether Colgate should try to beat the market or simply match it. Either can work. The question is whether Colgate has the expertise, resources, and accountability to execute the approach it chooses — and the Board shows no sign of questioning the current one despite a decade of poor results.
Other schools have. There are several legitimate paths, each with successful real-world examples:
Build a professional in-house team. As Wesleyan did in 2010. The record of full-time teams led by experienced investors is remarkable: every Yale protégé profiled by the New York Times in 2016 who went on to run a peer endowment has produced top-quartile ten-year returns. Brown took a different route — a leader from outside the Yale tradition, an excellent team built from scratch — and now ranks #1 among peers. The common factor isn’t pedigree or location (Amherst’s team is in Boston). It’s full-time, well-trained people who answer for the results.
Hire a professional outside firm. Firms like TIFF and Cambridge Associates do this for universities that don’t want their own teams. Performance varies — among firms, and even among teams within a firm — so team selection matters as much as the decision to outsource. But the option is real, and the better firms have strong long-term records.
Match the market at low cost. A diversified, low-cost portfolio built for a long horizon is a legitimate choice for any institution that prioritizes simplicity, liquidity, and cost. Over the past decade this approach would have beaten most endowments — including Colgate’s.
Each path looks different, but all require the same thing: a board with the expertise to choose intelligently, the transparency to be judged on results, and the willingness to change course when necessary. Colgate shows none of these. The result is the worst of all worlds: high costs, poor returns, and no plan to fix it.
WHY I AM ASKING FOR YOUR SUPPORT
I have tried, unsuccessfully, to raise my concerns over a period of years, through the Development Office, CIO, President Casey, and the Board
I now believe only our collective voice can persuade Colgate to improve endowment practices
No matter how much you've given in the past, helping to improve endowment management could be the biggest financial impact you will ever have on Colgate
Petition
WE ARE PETITIONING FOR
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Disclosure of managers’ rankings in their respective markets, showing Colgate’s skill at hiring investment managers
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Annual performance updates, including long-term performance ranking relative to an appropriate peer group ($1B+ peers) and benchmark
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Disclosure of managers and their fees
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Regular independent (non-CIO and Investment Committee) assessments of performance and benchmark
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Course corrections when long-term performance is poor, potentially transitioning to an inexpensive, passive indexing strategy.
Please join me in asking for more transparency and accountability.