Founded in 1821, McGill University (McGill) is a public university in Montreal, named after fur trader James McGill for his donation of a 46-acre estate to build the school’s campus. Today, McGill University spans three campuses: a downtown Montreal campus, a Macdonald campus, and the Gault Nature Reserve for wildlife research. McGill has more than 80 departments, which offer 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.

In fall 2020, McGill University had 39,736 enrolled students. This included 27,484 undergraduate students, 10,265 graduate and PhD students, 1,349 residents and fellows, and 638 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. It states that 11% of its students are currently pursuing PhDs as part of their graduate studies, compared to 7% of students at other Canadian research universities.

McGill reported 1,730 tenured and tenure-stream faculty members in F2020. During the year, McGill signed 198 government and industry-sponsored research contracts, valued at around $20m. It also signed 26 new clinical trial agreements in F2020. Currently, McGill is home to 174 Canada Research Chairs.

McGill University is a Major 100 charity, one of Canada’s largest charities in terms of donations. It received cash donations of $156.3m in F2020. During the year, McGill also received $731.1m in government funding (55% of revenues) and $380.9m in tuition and contract fees (29% of revenues).

Administrative costs are 23% of revenues (less investment income) and fundraising costs are 14% of donations. This results in total overhead spending of 36%. For every dollar donated to the charity, 64 cents go to the cause. This is just outside of Ci’s reasonable range for overhead spending. McGill was previously within this reasonable range in F2019. Its fundraising ratio rose in F2020 due to a 12% drop in donations and a 6% increase in fundraising costs.

McGill has $498.7m in net funding reserves ($1.8 billion in liquid assets less $1.3 billion in interest-bearing debts). Its liquid assets also include $1.5 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 31% or less than four months of annual program costs.

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

Updated on August 30, 2021 by Eric Zhao.