ESU Foundation endowment drops 25 percent

Emporia State’s Foundation has lost $14 million since last year’s stock market crash. The loss amounts to 25 percent of the foundation’s total endowment and is worse than what was previously estimated.

“At this point in time, (what the endowment was worth) to me is irrelevant,” said President Michael Lane last week, before the new loss estimate was released. “It doesn’t matter what it was. I do know that our foundation investments are performing better than the national average. We are not losing as much as average educational foundations across the country.”

In previous interviews, ESU administrators have reported that the losses only amounted to 19 percent of the ESU endowment.

Judith Heasley, president of the ESU Foundation, said that after speaking to the foundation’s investment managers last Friday, the loss estimate was revised to 25 percent. The estimate was released in response to The Bulletin’s request for the current worth of the foundation’s endowment ...