Shepherd University Foundation

Shepherd University Foundation

The Shepherd University Foundation incorporated in 1961 as a 501(c)(3) supporting organization for Shepherd University in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. Its volunteer board, led by President Christopher S. Colbert and with Austin J. Slater, Jr. as treasurer, stewards an investment portfolio alongside physical assets including McMurran Hall on campus and the Agricultural Innovation Center at Tabler Farm. The foundation's deployment model blends endowment management with direct real-asset ownership, unusual for a public-university foundation of its size. Its balance sheet holds McMurran Hall, Potomac Place residential property, the Bonnie & Bill Stubblefield Academic Field Station, and the Bachner Sculpture Collection. The Agricultural Innovation Center at Tabler Farm adds an operating-farm component. On the liquid side, the foundation manages an endowment investment portfolio, though it discloses no specific fund commitments or allocations publicly. The foundation's governance architecture relies on a board of volunteer directors operating under four principles: Giving, Gathering, Guarding, and Goodwill. In addition to its donor societies — the Joseph P. McMurran Society for estate-plan donors, the President's Club for leadership annual givers, and the Scarborough Society for library support — the foundation houses the Women Investing in Shepherd (WISH) philanthropic group, which has awarded over $1 million in grants. Total assets under management remain undisclosed. What distinguishes the foundation structurally is its direct ownership of operating assets — farmland, residential property, sculpture — alongside a traditional liquid investment pool, under a governance model that explicitly charges board members with both fundraising and fiduciary stewardship. The dual mandate creates a sourcing pipeline where donor-relations staff and volunteer directors cultivate gifts that flow into either immediate program support or permanent endowment principal, with the foundation maintaining direct custody of hard assets rather than delegating all holdings to external managers.