David Katz forwarded me an interesting article from the Harvard Business Review Daily Stat this week.
The headline cuts to the chase:
“When a male ex-athlete’s former college team wins a conference championship, his donations to his alma mater increase 7%, according to Jonathan Meer of Stanford and Harvey S. Rosen of Princeton. There’s no such effect among female ex-athletes, however, and for alums who weren’t athletes, the success of the school’s teams has no impact on donations.”
The full working paper is available here.
We should note that this study is based on data from one school (Princeton). The authors admit that these results shouldn’t be generalized to other schools with alumni who might value athletics differently than Princeton.
Any hypotheses as to why Princetonian men might increase their average gift during a championship year while women don’t?
Based on the recently-announced preseason Ivy Football Media Poll, Harvard, Penn and Brown will be vying for the boost in alumni dollars after this season!
Ever True!
Brent