Stanford is outpacing Yale and Columbia in its record-breaking effort to fundraise $4.3 billion by 2011, according to The Daily’s analysis of data compiled by The Chronicle of Higher Education.

University officials have tallied up tens of millions of dollars since they announced the Stanford Challenge on Oct. 10, including $36.5 million in November, the last full month for which data is available.

“We had a busy fall quarter and December was another strong month for us,” said Martin Shell, who oversees the University’s fundraising effort as vice president for development. “Campaigns like this are executed in phases. The nucleus phase concluded in October with the public launch of the campaign.”

The University reported having raised $2.249 billion as of Nov. 30. Early gifts to the campaign totaled about $2.19 billion.

Shell and his staff are focused on recruiting volunteers who can reach out for funds and “extending the campaign message to a much broader audience.”

December is typically the busiest fundraising month of the year for nonprofits, as donors look to offset tax gains with charitable contributions.

“Because of the timing of year-end gifts, we will continue to process contributions made in December for at least another 10 working days,” Shell said in an email late Friday. “Therefore, it will be the end of January before we have a complete assessment of our calendar year-end gift activity.”

The Stanford Challenge has seven major initiatives, in areas ranging from undergraduate education to the environment and international studies.

“A number of substantial new commitments from individuals were made in November,” he said, noting that campaign commitments in November were roughly equally divided between new pledges and new outright cash gifts. “These covered a broad range of the campaign themes.”

According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, 28 American universities have capital campaigns trying to raise more than $1 billion dollars. New York University raised $60.6 million in November, the most of any school.

Burt McMurtry, the chairman of the University’s Board of Trustees, has called this fundraising drive “the mort forward and onward-looking campaign in the University’s history.”