SAN MARCOS ---- The value of the endowment at Cal State San Marcos dipped slightly, but the university's investments outperformed its peers' funds during the uncertain economy of the last fiscal year, an official of the CSUSM Foundation said Monday.

The overall return ---- from stocks and bonds as well as money market funds ---- came to 5.25 percent, outpacing a national sample of similar public institutions in which the return rate averaged 3.1 percent, said Greg Svatora, the director of finance and business services for the CSUSM Foundation.

The endowment, which has grown nine-fold since 1993, is made up of contributions from foundations, corporations and individuals and is aimed at supporting deserving students with scholarship money.

Even as the endowment lost money ---- one fifth of one percent of market value ---- the CSUSM Foundation also managed to reap a rate of return on stocks that surpassed the key Standard & Poor's 500 market index, Svatora said. Using a scale devised by the National Association of College & University Business Officers that factors out dividends, he said, the university's return on investments in stocks came to 1.84 percent versus a 0.3 percent for the S & P stocks.

The dip in the value, which amounted to $1,668, brought the endowment at San Marcos to $9.69 million for the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2003. The endowment is worth some $2.5 million more than it was two years ago.

Annual giving at Cal State San Marcos fell from $6.3 million of 2002 to $3.5 million last year, a 44 percent drop. Last year saw a $2.6 million gift from Helene Clarke of Oceanside. It was only the third year in the last decade that the level of giving dropped.

"It was a tough time for all of higher education, and we were no exception," said CSUSM spokesman Rick Moore. "There was a fragile state of donor confidence in their portfolios (and) the budget cut caused us to reduce the resources we'd been able to devote to fund-raising."

With the university presidency in transition ---- former President Alexander Gonzalez departed in June ---- the indefinite nature of the situation made it difficult to secure major commitments from donors, Moore said. Karen S. Haynes, the third full-time president in the university's 15 years is set to report for work Monday.

CSUSM invests half the endowment's assets in stocks, 40 percent in bonds and 10 percent in money market funds. At 10.4 percent, CSUSM's yield from bonds matched that of the key Lehman bond index.

A study out this month from the National Association of College & University Business Officers notes that, on average, American colleges and universities did not maintain the value of their endowments in fiscal 2003. The association reported a median return of 2.9 percent on investment for all 2,127 institutions surveyed, not just those with endowments such as CSUSM's that are less than $25 million.

Throughout the CSU system, contributions were off some $20 million, or 7.6 percent for the past year. It was the CSU's first decline in a decade ---- a reduction that Richard West, the system's chief financial officer, said reflects a national trend in giving to higher education brought on by "donor uncertainty in a period of slow economic recovery."

San Marcos was one of six CSU campuses reporting a decline in the market value of the endowment. CSU Monterey Bay was off 44 percent; CSU Stanislaus was down 27 percent; and CSU Northridge fell 17.5 percent. At San Diego State, the value was up 3.66 percent, bringing the endowment to $77 million.

The total value of the endowments on the CSU campuses rose 6.5 percent., bringing it to $518 million. By contrast, Stanford University, a private institution, reports an endowment of $8.6 billion, a number that's up 13 percent over fiscal 2002.