MIT plans to make significant investments in the next fiscal year to support the Institute community, strengthen its research enterprise, and enhance its digital and physical infrastructure.
The Institute announced in October that its pooled investments recorded a return of 55.5 percent - the strongest annual performance in more than 20 years - bringing the endowment to $27.4 billion. These exceptional results provided a unique opportunity for MIT to accelerate distribution from its endowment to tackle an array of Institute priorities in fiscal year 2023 - including an expansion of undergraduate financial aid and graduate student funding.
"MIT has arrived at an exciting moment. We are back together on campus, moving forward on priorities identified by our community," says L. Rafael Reif, MIT's president. "We were delighted to be able to provide a special pay increase last year, and we are expanding support across the Institute for our students, staff, faculty, and postdocs. We are also increasing our investment in cutting-edge research and infrastructure, to ensure that MIT will continue to serve as a magnet for the world's finest talent."
Of the additional funds from the payout on pooled investments, approximately 60 percent are restricted by donors for specific purposes, such as professorships, scholarships, fellowships, and research. The remaining 40 percent can be used for general Institute needs.
"In allocating these additional unrestricted funds, we needed to balance addressing compelling needs while also being mindful that the economic climate is volatile," says Glen Shor, MIT's executive vice president and treasurer. "Some priorities call for one-time investments, but most require recurring funding beyond next fiscal year, so it's important for MIT to be in a position where we can maintain these investments and not have to scale them back down the road."
Spending priorities were based on wide-ranging sources of perspective and feedback, including budget meetings with units, recommendations from Visiting Committees, and ideas generated by Task Force 2021 and Beyond, an MIT-wide effort to chart a course for the future of the Institute.
Supporting the MIT community
As a first step in allocating the new funds, in December 2021 the Institute provided a special 3 percent increase for eligible campus-based employees, graduate students, and postdocs to recognize the remarkable efforts put forth by the Institute community over the course of the pandemic.
