McGill University is a top-rated five-star charity and one of Canada's largest charities. As with most large universities, it has a high results reporting grade and is financially transparent. The university's gross funding reserves can cover program costs for around 6 months.

Founded in 1821, McGill University (McGill) is a public university in Montreal. McGill has three campuses: a downtown Montreal campus, a Macdonald campus, and the Gault Nature Reserve for wildlife research. McGill has more than 80 departments. It offers over 300 undergraduate and 400 graduate programs of study. McGill’s main programs are education and research, for which it does not provide a spending breakdown.

A Charity Intelligence 2023 Top 100 Rated Charity

In fall 2022, McGill University had 39,513 enrolled students. This included 27,085 undergraduate students and 10,344 graduate and PhD students. It hosted 1,432 residents and fellows and 647 postdoctoral scholars. McGill reports that around 47% of its students are from Quebec, 23% are from the rest of Canada, and 30% are from outside Canada. In 2021, McGill awarded 5,960 undergraduate degrees, 1,247 master’s degrees and 517 doctoral degrees.

In fall 2022, McGill reported to have 1,778 tenured and tenure-stream faculty members. As of F2022, McGill is home to 182 Canada Research Chairs. The university has 234 active fellows of the Royal Society of Canada. In 2021 McGill researchers authored 10,464 published papers.

McGill University is a Major 100 charity, one of Canada’s largest charities in terms of donations. It received cash donations of $176.9m in F2022, plus $11.9m in international donations. During the year, McGill also received $943.7m in government funding (56% of revenues) and $415.7m in tuition and contract fees (24% of revenues).

Administrative costs are 18% of revenues (less investment income) and fundraising costs are 10% of donations. This results in total overhead spending of 27%. For every dollar donated to the charity, 73 cents go to the cause.

McGill has $875.4m in net funding reserves ($2.2 billion in liquid assets less $1.4 billion in interest-bearing debts). Its liquid assets also include $1.7 billion in donor-endowed funds, resulting in a negative net program cost coverage ratio. McGill’s gross funding reserves, excluding donor-endowed funds, can cover 50% or around 6 months annual program costs.

Charity Intelligence has sent this update to McGill University for review. Changes and edits may be forthcoming.

Updated on May 30, 2023 by Alessandra Castino.