A Sample Gift Agreement From the University of Texas at Austin

The development office at the University of Texas at Austin views the signing of a gift agreement as a great stewardship opportunity, and it works to make things easy—and even festive—for the donor.

“We don’t want to make the process cumbersome or overly bureaucratic, so we try to minimize the effort required, the number of signatures,” says Karl Miller, executive director of development at the university.

This particular example of an agreement for an endowment gift or pledge calls for signatures from both the donor and the dean of the college the donation supports. Depending on the gift, the agreement may also require the signature of the provost, the university president, or both.

The signing ideally is done in person: The donor might come to campus to finalize the agreement with the dean, or the dean might go to the donor. To commemorate the event, a staff member often photographs the signing. The development office later includes the photos in a thank-you note and publishes them on the website or in a university publication, sharing the donor’s story and describing how the gift is making a difference.

Signing events are sometimes followed by small celebrations like a reception for the donor with faculty, staff, and students or a dinner for the donor with the dean, department chair, or program director.

But sometimes the process takes place through the mail. In that case, the donor signs the form and mails it to the development office, which then returns a copy to the donor with the dean’s signature. “We prefer original hard copies,” Mr. Miller says.