For the first time since students and alumni founded the Dartmouth Investment in Philanthropy Program in 2007, the student-managed stock portfolio has gained a profit equalling 5 percent of the original endowment, according to DIPP co-president Tiffany Tai '11. The investment group recently decided to use its profits to distribute $5,000 between three campus groups Project RightChoice, the Dartmouth Global Leadership Program and the College's chapter of Habitat for Humanity and plans to make additional donations to student-run philanthropic organizations in the future as the market allows, Tai said.
DIPP, which began with anonymous donations from multiple alumni totaling $300,000, invests funds for philanthropic purposes and allows members to gain experience directly managing a portfolio, Tai said.
Despite an initial 35-percent drop in the group's original investment as a result of the 2008 stock market collapse, DIPP discovered that its original investment had grown by more than 5 percent from 2008 to the beginning of Winter term, according to DIPP co-presidents Alex Martinian '11 and Valentin Yanev '11 said.
"In the spring of 2009 we overhauled the portfolio, and since then we've been actively making purchases," Yanev said. "It turned out really well over the last couple of terms we've outperformed the market by 20 percent."
Because the value of the group's portfolio exceeded that of the original investment for the first time, DIPP decided to begin distributing its profits to student-run philanthropic organizations and set up a committee to select the beneficiaries.
DIPP settled on distributing $5,000 to various campus groups that "demonstrated significant need for funds" after determining it would still have "a decent amount of cash to invest going forward," Martinian said.
Dartmouth's chapter of Habitat for Humanity received $2,500, the largest donation, according to the organization's student director Peter Hagan '11. Hagan said the funding "came at the perfect time."
"We lost some of our other student funding this year, and we've been scrambling to make it up," he said.
The funds will cover the cost of a drywall and doors project in the near future, according to Hagan.
"It's a house on Peabody Street in Lebanon," Hagan said. "This is going to be a project where we're finishing up the second half of a duplex we started in 2009, so it's very satisfying to be able to finish it."
Project RightChoice, a student-run nonprofit organization that fundraises for a different charity each year, received $1,500 from DIPP, student director Wills Begor '12 said.
This year, group members are supporting Water.org, a charity that digs wells in developing countries, according to Begor. The group's members will finance their spring fundraiser a "Cinco de Mayo extravaganza" that will include dinner, dancing and a raffle with the DIPP funding, Begor said.
"We're making sure the money goes directly to building wells, not overhead for Water.org," he said.
DGLP also accepted a $1,000 donation from DIPP, according to DGLP student co-director Ariana Almas '11.The donation will help defray transportation costs for alternative spring break trips to Houston, Texas; Hartford, Vt.; and El Rosario, Honduras, DGLP student co-director Kunal Patel '11 said.
The money will also help ease the group's transition into a completely student-run organization and enhance the quality of the service trips through pre-trip site visits by group leaders, Almas said. "We want the group leaders to actually be able to talk the leaders of the community they will be serving," she said.
The College's Endowment Administration Office is responsible for DIPP's account and handles all monetary transactions, Martinian said. The alumni who endowed the group deliberately left both structural and financial decisions up to the students, he said.
"It's completely student-run," Tai said. "[The alumni] wanted to give students the opportunity to learn how to invest."
The group currently owns approximately 20 stocks, according to Yanev.
