Sustaining Excellence: Ambitious £30 million secured for Merton’s 750th Anniversary

The pennies and pounds have been counted and the Warden of Merton College is delighted to confirm that Merton College has reached its staggeringly ambitious fundraising goal of £30 million, in advance of the end of the College’s 750th Anniversary Year, and the official end of the Anniversary Campaign, Sustaining Excellence. Our thanks go out to all 2,825 Mertonians and friends of the College for your generous support which has enabled this remarkable feat.

Each and every penny of the £30 million raised over the course of this 7 year-long campaign (which was launched publicly on Tuesday, 24 May 2011 at Draper’s Hall in London) will help ensure that Merton College’s excellence - as a world-renowned seat of learning and research - continues to flourish into the future.

Of the total raised, £15 million is being invested to help guarantee the Tutorial System which is so central to Merton College and the University of Oxford’s excellence; £8 million will go towards Supporting Students, to help with the College’s goal of continuing to attract the world’s best students at undergraduate and graduate level, regardless of their ability to pay; and £7 million will go towards protecting and resourcing Merton’s historic buildings.

The Sustaining Excellence Campaign runs until the end of the Anniversary Year and there are still multiple ongoing priorities and projects that require urgent funds:

• We still have £453,000 to raise to re-endow one Law Fellowship, which will strengthen and secure the College’s teaching of Jurisprudence.
• There is a shortfall of £340,000 in the Undergraduate Student Support Fund. All money donated to this Fund will help provide much-needed undergraduate bursaries, which ensure that the best students can study at Merton, regardless of their financial circumstances.
• £204,000 is needed for the essential renovation and extension of the Merton Boathouse, which was last upgraded in the 1940s!