When Lessinger left the chair in 1996, UNF had trouble recruiting a scholar to take over. Finally, the chair became a visiting scholar program in which educators from around the country visit and give lectures about education reform. Rather than paying a salary, the chair pays a stipend to speakers and pays to publicize the lectures. "I was not entirely satisfied with this rotating thing," Schultz admits. "It was nice, it brought in some fine lecturers, but it wasn’t on the cutting edge of education." Schultz felt that the chair was not achieving what he had intended, yet he knew that under the gift agreement he had very little leverage. He could neither withdraw the gift nor make any demands on the university to fill the chair as he wished.

"Once you’ve given the money and signed the agreement, you have no recourse," says Lisa Philp of JPMorgan Private Bank in New York, who explains that donors must realize the permanent nature of a gift of this kind, particularly when the endowed chair carries the family name. One of her clients endowed a chair decades ago that was later offered to a rather controversial scholar. "Every time he was quoted in the press, he was identified by the chair he holds, and so the family name was continually linked to this provocative research," Philp says. After several attempts to contact the university and express their displeasure, family members gave up and severed ties with the school.

TOP VIEW: Donors who establish university chairs may be surprised to find that after the donation is accepted, they get little or no say in the academics hired for the newly created position. To avoid frustration over how a gift is ultimately used, experts advise donors to establish long-term philanthropic relationships with the universities they fund and, like any financial transaction, negotiate the details.

"If we had to do it again, we could go a long way toward alleviating that situation," Philp says. "We could spell out in more detail in the grant agreement what kind of researcher the donor would want."

Schultz could have found himself forced into a similar situation, but he had a number of factors in his favor. First, he had maintained a strong, long-term relationship with the school. In 2002, he funded an entire educational program and the building in which it resides. The Schultz Center for Teaching and Leadership is a master’s degree program and continuing education program for local teachers and principals. Second, Schultz has been active in education reform for 40 years. He has many contacts in this field and can serve as a resource for the university to help fill the position.

So when Schultz made a phone call earlier this year to UNF president John Delaney to discuss his concerns, Delaney listened. Then Schultz called the university’s provost and the dean of the college of education. They all agreed that the chair could be used more effectively. "They are presenting me with a plan next week. I have been working with them, so I have some sense of what they’re going to be coming up with," Shultz says. "They were very nice to ask me if I had any ideas about who should hold the chair, and they’ve been very kind in keeping me involved lately." The back story, of course, is that he is a major donor, and the school has every intention of keeping him happy.

Rock-Star Scientist
Endowing a college chair, particularly one that bears your name, begins a long-term relationship. "It’s like a marriage," says James Rogers, vice president of development at Eastern University in St. Davids, Pa. "There’s a courtship, then you ask the question. Then hopefully the relationship matures over the years." Donors should be prepared to woo as long as four years to sign an agreement in principal, prior to the actual gift agreement. The first step in this process is to understand why universities want endowed chairs and what they expect of the donors who create them.

"Universities need these positions to recruit faculty," says Tom Kinnear, executive director of the Zell Lurie Institute for Entrepreneurial Studies at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, who likens the top tier of faculty to rock stars. "Try and get these great teachers to your school without an endowed chair, and they won’t talk to you."