Excellent though academic resources at Columbia may be, when it comes to money, the University is sorely lacking. While Columbia's endowment is ranked eighth nationally, it still falls far short of those of Harvard, Yale, and Princeton. Unfortunately, the University's relatively small endowment often prevents it from meeting important needs for students-most notably financial aid. The recently announced capital campaign marks an exciting move for Columbia, and it is up to the University to follow through on its fundraising goals and promised allocations.

The campaign-the largest in history for an American university-actually began two years ago with quiet solicitations of large-scale donations from alumni. Last Friday marked the official beginning of the public phase of the campaign. Administrators brought the University community up to speed on the silent phase and laid out future plans. While it is impossible to know exactly how much money will end up where just yet, it is clear that the University plans to put the money in the right places: $440 million has been earmarked for undergraduate financial aid alone.

But the most difficult part of the campaign will not be figuring out how much money to put into different initiatives-it will be raising the money itself. To date, the University has raised $1.6 billion of the proposed $4 billion campaign, most of which has come in the form of large-scale gifts. As the campaign goes public, the hope is that larger numbers of alumni will donate, if in smaller amounts. Unfortunately, Columbia has a shoddy track record when it comes to alumni donations, and it is imperative that University leaders remember as much in the next few months. If the focal point of the campaign is not only to raise money but to build a strong alumni network in the United States and abroad, then a considerable amount of effort will have to go into planning and carrying out donation solicitations. It is up to Columbia to give its students and alumni a reason to give back, one that will encourage them to give money to Columbia over other potential causes.

Columbia is currently paving the way for significant University overhaul. The capital campaign has the potential for wide-ranging and far-reaching impact-from undergraduate financial aid to the proposed Manhattanville campus. But the campaign will only have a genuine lasting effect if it convinces donors to keep on giving for years to come. Improving Columbia has as much to do with money as it does with its students, past and present.