After raising $3.2 billion through the Michigan Difference capital campaign from 2004 to 2008, officials are starting to plan the University’s next major fundraising program.

University President Mary Sue Coleman, Provost Philip Hanlon and other officials, in conjunction with deans of schools and colleges at the University, are currently in the process of establishing campaign goals that fulfill their vision for the University as it moves into its third century.

“We’re not ready to launch or anything like that, but we’re in the planning phase. We’re talking to our deans, we’re trying to identify the needs,” Coleman said in an interview with The Michigan Daily last month.

Jerry May, the University’s vice president for development, explained that a capital campaign is essentially “fundraising on steroids.” Tom Baird, the executive director of the campaign, added that while the University continuously fundraises, a campaign provides more sustained and nuanced fundraising efforts.

“Year in and year out, we raise money, but there’s always needs. What a campaign does is it really focuses you and revs everyone up and sustains us and provides a context to raise money for more specific goals,” Baird said.

The construction of 22 new campus buildings was financed by money raised from the Michigan Difference campaign, including now-iconic campus fixtures such as the Ross School of Business building, the Ford School of Public Policy’s Weill Hall and the new C.S. Mott Children’s and Von Voigtlander Women’s Hospital.

Also, the Michigan Difference funded 1,969 new scholarships and 185 new professorships.

While the University hasn’t released the specific date that the campaign will start, May said in an interview with the Daily last fall that the campaign will launch sometime “during this decade.”

May said the University has embarked upon a major fundraising drive every decade since the 1940s, except the 1970s. With the University’s 2017 bicentennial approaching, May said it’s likely that the campaign will overlap with the celebrations on campus.

“One of our greatest distinctions in this new campaign is that we’re going to start the third century,” May said. “That’s a pretty good thing. One of the things about campaigns is that you want to appeal to tradition.”

Though the campaign’s official launch may be years in the future, University’s deans have held discussions regarding specific goals and have also met with Coleman, Hanlon, the University’s Board of Regents and other officials over the past year, May said.

Coleman said a new cancer center at the University Hospital and further collaboration between the Ross School of Business and the College of Engineering have been discussed, but noted these are just preliminary ideas.

“There are all sorts of ideas bubbling up right now, and that’s what’s so exciting about planning the campaign. We’re not there yet, but I’m just hearing all these great ideas,” Coleman said.

As goals for the campaign are being established, the University’s Office of Development is laying the groundwork for the campaign’s fundraising infrastructure. May, Baird and the rest of the fundraising team have begun to train the deans and development staff in preparation for the campaign.

Several new deans — including Alison Davis-Blake, dean of the Business School, and Marie Lynn Miranda, dean of the School of Natural Resources and Environment — that have joined the University since the last campaign ended, will need to start developing relationships with donors, May said.

“When (deans) come in, they need to be trained in the Michigan culture,” May said. “Some need to be shored up in fundraising, others need to come in and understand how Michigan works.”

Baird said he’s the “details guy” in terms of fundraising training and preliminary planning for the upcoming capital campaign.