Howard University Defined Benefit Pension Plan

Howard University Defined Benefit Pension Plan

Howard University's Defined Benefit Pension Plan secures the retirement obligations of faculty and staff at the Washington, D.C.-based historically Black university, founded in 1867. President Ben Vinson III serves as a trustee of the plan, while the day-to-day investment program falls under CIO and Treasurer Frank Bello. The plan's governance is anchored by Shelley Stewart Jr., chair of the Board of Trustees' Finance Committee, and Levoyd E. Robinson, a trustee who concurrently leads CFI Partners as CEO and CIO. The plan's investment strategy spans traditional and alternative asset classes. Public equity exposure includes a dedicated mid-to-large cap U.S. equity allocation. On the private side, the portfolio reaches into venture capital, private debt on a global basis, and inflation-hedging strategies. Real asset commitments have included Boston-based Berkshire Multifamily Value Plus Fund IV, a mixed-use vehicle, and San Diego-focused Southwest Value Partners Fund XVIII, a commercial real estate fund. The plan participates in the NACUBO-Commonfund Study of Endowments, placing its operations alongside a peer group of higher-education asset owners that frequently share investment office practices. Howard's investment office leans on the dual expertise of its board and staff. Levoyd Robinson brings institutional credit-market knowledge from his role at CFI Partners, a Chicago-based alternative asset manager. Frank Bello manages the university's broader Retirement Trust, integrating the pension plan's objectives with Howard's overall treasury function. The plan's structure — a corporate-style defined benefit plan within a nonprofit university — gives it a distinct liability profile from the university's endowment, which is managed separately. The board's direct access to institutional managers through trustee relationships sets a structural dynamic uncommon among university pension plans. Robinson's concurrent CIO seat at a private credit firm creates an information channel that may inform the plan's growing private debt allocation. Howard's presence in the NACUBO study group places its strategy in a comparative framework used by endowments and foundations, though the plan's fixed-benefit obligation creates a decidedly different risk posture than a perpetual-life endowment.