Harvard Raises Fundraising Bar With $6.5-Billion Goal

Harvard University announced on Saturday that it has launched a $6.5-billion fundraising campaign, a record target for an institution of higher education, The Boston Globe reports.

If successful, the drive would more than double the take from Harvard’s last capital campaign and would top the current record for a college or university, the $6.23-billion Stanford amassed in a five-year campaign that wrapped up at the end of 2011. The University of Southern California is also in the midst of a $6-billion campaign.

The Harvard effort, to run through 2018, aims to support expansion of the Cambridge, Mass., campus into nearby Allston, renovate aging undergraduate residential halls, and boost engineering programs. The school said it already raised $2.8-billion toward the new goal during a two-year “quiet phase” of the campaign.