Manhattan ? Kansas State University alumni love their alma mater so much that they will prove it with their pocketbooks, President Jon Wefald said.

In his annual state of the university speech, Wefald said he was confident that K-State would reach $100 million a year in donations over the next five years.

“We will raise half a billion dollars,” he said Friday.

Wefald pledged to continue efforts to make Kansas State one of the top 10 land-grant universities, to make the faculty and student body more diverse, and to improve campus information technology and Hale Library.

“The difference between K-State and other universities is a sense of urgency,” he said.

Reductions in state and federal funds require the university to come up with additional money from other sources, including increases in tuition, Wefald said.

“It’s very difficult to make a championship university when faculty salaries aren’t halfway decent,” he said. “We’re going to have to find revenue from a variety of sources.”