Donors at Ryerson getting stingy—maybe

Paul Stenton, a vice-president at Ryerson University, says alumni donations to the university have fallen by 5 per cent in the past five years, the student paper the Eyeopenerreported. But Bob Baker, the executive director of university advancement, says they have been growing.

Baker said that this has been the strongest year for alumni donations ever, adding that since Stenton looked at the Maclean’s surveys for information, his methodology might be misleading.

The article went on to quote an alumnus describing how involvement in alumni events has grown.

Stenton’s comments came during a board of governors meeting. He was not available for comment, the Eyeopener stated.

We at Maclean’s On Campus are just as confused as you about this story.

Until 2006, and as part of the annual University Rankings issue Maclean’s did gather data on the number of alumni at each university who had given to their university. But the magazine never collected data on the dollar amounts donated by alumni — which is what Stenton and Baker appear to have been disagreeing over in the Eyeopener story.