Establish a legacy and support the GSD through planned giving.

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Planned gifts can help provide for your family, save taxes, and enhance your financial objectives, while establishing an enduring legacy that will directly impact students and the Harvard Graduate School of Design. Many alumni and friends have used planned gifts to support student financial aid, faculty research, and design innovation.

Your gifts go towards solving current and future global challenges like climate change, affordable housing, and efficient transportation systems.

Types of Planned Giving

  • A Charitable Bequest is an easy and tax-advantaged way to make a generous gift to the GSD and create a lasting legacy. You can establish a bequest through your will or living trust, or by naming the GSD as the beneficiary of your retirement account or life insurance policy. Sample language to include in your will.
  • Charitable Gift Annuities are a tax-wise way to secure income for you and/or your heirs while making a gift to the GSD. A minimum gift of $25,000 is required for the first annuity, and Harvard will make fixed payments based on the age of the beneficiary(ies). Link to view Harvard University Gift Annuity Rates.
  • Other gift types include: Gifts of Real Estate, Charitable Remainder Trusts, Charitable Lead Trusts, Donor Advised Funds, and Gifts of Art, and other assets.

Benefits of Planned Giving
When you establish a planned gift, you become a member of the Warren Society, a remarkable community of design thinkers who stay connected to the GSD. Through invitations to special events, exhibits, and lectures, listing in our annual GSD Giving report, and GSD events around the United States, you can join with other passionate design leaders who are making enduring impacts.

For more information on planned giving, please contact Joe Chart, Senior Major Gifts Officer.

About H. Langford WarrenWarren headshot

The Warren Society honors H. Langford Warren (1857–1917), an exemplary leader and visionary who founded the School of Architecture at Harvard and served as its first Chair. By joining science and fine arts with the study of architecture, he established a model of cross-disciplinary collaboration that is still a hallmark of the GSD. Additionally, Warren helped develop the nascent field of landscape architecture.

Planned Giving Tax Information

Tax Identification Number

Harvard University’s Tax ID number is 04-2103580.

Tax Law Changes

Tax-Free IRA Rollover Permanently Extended

On Friday, December 18, 2015, Congress passed the IRA charitable rollover provision of the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act of 2015, which included permanent reinstatement of the IRA charitable rollover opportunity.

Under this legislation, qualified donors may make outright gifts of up to $100,000 per year to Harvard from their IRA and avoid taxation on the distribution. For gifts to be counted toward the required minimum distribution (RMD) for 2016, transfers must be made by December 31, 2016.

To benefit from this gift opportunity, the following qualifications must be met:

  • Donor must be age 70 ½ or older at the time of transfer.
  • The maximum amount a donor may transfer is $100,000.
  • The gift must be outright. Gifts to donor advised funds or to life income vehicles do not qualify.
  • The gift must be transferred directly from the IRA account by the IRA administrator to Harvard.  Donors with check-writing ability for their IRAs may use this feature to complete their gift.

To assist donors interested in making a charitable gift from their IRA, we have provided the following sample letters:

The first letter contains specific transfer instructions from the donor to the IRA custody agent.

The second letter is from the donor to Harvard to inform Harvard as to how the gift should be used. This letter is particularly important for donors interested in splitting their gift between multiple Schools or Harvard affiliates. It also ensures Harvard’s ability to provide appropriate class credit to alumni donors.

Donor Stories

 

David-Kay-2019-06-09Kay O’Neil MCRP ’78 and David Nelson MCRP ’78 Find Love, Give Back at the GSD

Statistical analysis and love don’t usually go together, but Kay O’Neil MCRP ’78 and David Nelson MCRP ’78 have found success with this unique pairing. To formalize that gratitude to the GSD, Kay and David have provided a generous gift to the school through their life insurance policy.

 

 

Doris Cole AB ’59, MArch ’63 and Hal Goyette MArch ’54: An Intellectual Oasisdoris 1

The Frances Loeb Library at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design (GSD) has evolved over the decades to meet the needs of design research and an always changing curriculum and pedagogy. For noted architect and author Doris Cole AB ’59, MArch ’63 and architect and planner Harold Goyette MArch ’54, when it came time to find a home for their archives, the Loeb Library was a natural choice because their life’s work could benefit students, scholars, and design enthusiasts.

 

A Lasting and Significant Impact at the GSD: Thomas Holtz MArch ’77Tom-Holtz_web2

Thomas Holtz MArch ’77 made his first mark on the Harvard University Graduate School of Design (GSD) library as an architectural draftsman. Holtz’s generosity and creativity built his second contribution to the library. The retired architect wanted to honor those who most influenced his graduate education and career: his parents and his design teacher Jerzy Soltan, the esteemed architect and beloved GSD professor who died in 2005. Through a charitable gift annuity and a future bequest, Holtz established the Jerzy Soltan Fund in memory of Leslie and Helen Holtz for the Frances Loeb Library.

04132016_grounded_fellowships6903_bart2Designing a Multidisciplinary Future at the GSD: Bart Voorsanger MArch ’64

Bart Voorsanger MArch ’64 understands the value of connected multidisciplinary design. The founding partner and principal of Voorsanger Architects PC in New York City, his firm works on projects ranging from small residential interiors to multi-million dollar residential and institutional buildings, many of which involve collaborations within other design disciplines. Voorsanger sees a future in which design disciplines increasingly intermingle. To ensure that students at the GSD are at the forefront of these intersections, he established the Voorsanger Fellowship Fund.

henry-hoover-300pxBuilding a Future at Harvard: The Henry B. Hoover Fellowship

In 1989, Henry B. (Harry) Hoover, Lucretia Hoover Giese PhD ’85, and Elizabeth Hoover Norman AM ’64—the three children of Harvard-trained architect Henry B. Hoover MArch ’26—decided to honor their father upon his death by establishing the Henry B. Hoover Fellowship. Its purpose is to benefit students in the Graduate School of Design, and it was established with gifts from family, friends, and colleagues.

 

 

 

GET IN TOUCH

JOSEPH CHART
Senior Major Gift Officer
[email protected]
617-384-8604