Financial Stewardship

What is Financial Stewardship?

Financial stewardship means protecting the long-term assets of an organization through a commitment to moral, ethical and prudent financial decision-making. Stewardship encourages a cooperative environment focused on the organization’s success.

What does it mean at UD?

True financial stewardship is conducted in service to our mission, which is especially important for UD as a Catholic, Marianist university. We must be good stewards of the hard-earned money entrusted to us by parents, students, sponsors, partners, and donors, mindful of the choices and sacrifices they make to send their children here and to support our Catholic, Marianist mission.

We must conserve these precious financial resources so that we can continue to carry out the University's most important mission-focused priorities including access and affordability to all socio-economic levels, high-quality instruction and high-touch experiential learning, research that advances understanding and makes a difference, and deep engagement with Dayton and other communities.

Why are we focusing on financial stewardship now?

Financial stewardship is crucially important to the University’s ability to continue to reinvest in our strategic priorities, including a high quality, socioeconomically and racially diverse student body. In addition, we are committed to continue funding strategic investments in our people and programs.

The University has acted proactively and with a focus on long-range sustainability and quality growth by making major new investments in a variety of areas, including both faculty and key staffing areas.  These investments are aimed at fortifying net undergraduate headcount and revenue while diversifying revenue sources in areas such as graduate enrollment, research, fundraising, and auxiliaries.

In order to support prudent financial management to meet the above goals, the University is working to standardize a wide range of spending practices that have often varied greatly in the past, and better align our spending with best practices in higher education.

What can I do as a member of the UD community?

We all have a responsibility to ensure the University fulfills its financial obligations to students, parents, donors and other stakeholders.  Understanding and following all financial policies and procedures is critical to ensure funds are spent responsibly. Further, an evaluation of all purchases—whether for travel, professional services or other goods and services—should always be done to ensure they are furthering the ability of the institution to serve its mission.

For specific guidance on recently revised/updated spending practices, please see the Measures tab. Links to additional resources can be found there, as well.

In addition, the Procurement and Payable Services office has guidance on how to purchase a wide range of items. Using our best purchasing practices allows the University to take advantage of lower negotiated prices, ensures goods are sourced from ethical and sustainable sources, and reduces institutional risks.