Toronto Metropolitan University is a four-star charity and one of Canada's largest charities. As with most universities, it has a high results reporting grade and is financially transparent. The university's overhead costs are within Ci's reasonable range, but it has high fundraising costs resulting in a four-star rating.

Founded in 1948, Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU), formerly named Ryerson University, is a public university in Ontario. Today, over 45,000 students attend TMU. The university has 62 different bachelor’s programs and 55 PhD and master’s programs. It also has 133 partner universities in 37 different countries. TMU’s main charitable programs are academics and research. In F2021, it spent $805.5m on its programs.

In fall of 2021, Toronto Metropolitan University had 46,812 students enrolled. This includes 39,871 undergraduate students, 3,006 master’s students, 646 PhD students, and 3,289 students in continuing education courses. Undergraduate students were enrolled across six faculties: Ted Rogers School of Management (11,897), Community Services (7,123), Communication and Design (6,060), Engineering and Architecture (5,685), Arts (5,256), and Science (3,850). The university reports that 3,404 of its undergraduate students are from outside of Canada, and 1,216 students are from a province other than Ontario. TMU reports that it has 900 affiliated and adjunct graduate faculty members, and 20 Canada Research Chairs. In F2021 its research program had 1,675 academic publications and supported five patent applications.

Toronto Metropolitan University is a Major 100 charity, one of Canada’s largest charities in terms of donations. It received $25.1m in Canadian donations in F2021. The university also received $408.1m in student fees (42% of total revenue) and $451.5m in government funding (47% of total revenue) during the year. TMU earned $42.7m in investment income, representing an 11% annual return. Its average annual return from F2018 to F2021 is 6%. From 2018 to 2021 the average annual investment return of the S&P 500 is around 17%.

Administrative costs are 4% of total revenue excluding investment income. Fundraising costs are 29% of donations. This results in total overhead spending of 32%. For every dollar donated to the charity, 68 cents go to the cause. This is within Ci’s reasonable range for overhead spending.

TMU has $383.2m in net funding reserves ($684.7m in liquid assets less $301.5 in interest-bearing debts). Its liquid assets also include $137.2m in donor-endowed funds. TMU’s net funding reserves, excluding donor-endowed funds, can cover annual program costs for around four months.

This charity report is an update that has been sent to Toronto Metropolitan University for review. Changes and edits may be forthcoming.

Updated on June 23rd, 2022 by Arjun Kapur.