An overview of notable donations compiled by the the Chronicle:
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Gerald and Ronald Chan gave $100 million through their Morningside Foundation to establish the MIT Morningside Academy for Design, a new research center to be housed in the School of Architecture and Planning. The new design academy is scheduled to launch in September and will facilitate and administer academic and research programs across MIT, particularly between the School of Architecture and Planning and the School of Engineering.
Gerald Chan, who became a US citizen in the 1970s, co-founded Morningside Group, a private equity and venture capital firm, with his brother Ronald. Their late father founded Hang Lung Group, a Hong Kong property company, and was a longtime supporter of education.
DePauw University
Sharon Ubben is engaged $20 million towards the creation of a new school of business and leadership. She and her late husband, Timothy Ubben, both graduated from college in 1958. Timothy Ubben died in December.
He co-founded Lincoln Capital Management, a Chicago investment firm in 1967. He retired from the business in 1999. The Ubbens have given to the university since their first donation of $26 to the annual fundraiser of 1958. They endowed scholarships and established the Timothy and Sharon Ubben Endowed Lectureship in 1986. They gave the university a previous gift of $20 million in 2013.
Additionally, the university is reallocating a $20 million gift it received from 1968 DePauw graduates Steve and Karen Sanger, which the couple originally gave to create the Sanger Leadership Initiative. The program will be part of the new business school.
University of Oxford
Stephen Schwarzman gave about $33 million for the Stephen A. Schwarzman Center for the Humanities, slated to open in 2025. The center was named in the donor’s honor in 2019 following his gift of approximately $188 million. The center will house the Institute for Ethics in AI, the Oxford Internet Institute, a new library, and exhibition and performance spaces.
Schwarzman co-founded and leads the Blackstone Group, an investment management firm in New York. He is a prolific donor to institutions of higher learning and has dedicated a significant portion of his donations in recent years to university programs that ensure that new technologies are harnessed for the good of society. He appeared on the The Chronicle’s annual Philanthropy 50 list of the biggest donors five times.
Villanova University
Victor Maggitti Jr. donated $20 million to renovate the Falvey Memorial Library and build new spaces in the library for lectures and other campus events. Maggitti founded Vimco, a company of the King of Prussia, in Pennsylvania, which manufactures and distributes construction supplies and accessories. He founded the company in 1960 and continues to lead it today. Maggitti received a bachelor’s degree in accounting from the Villanova School of Business in 1956.
Rhode Island Foundation
Robert and Joyce Andrew are gone $12 million to establish the Robert G. and Joyce Andrew College Scholarship Fund to help Rhode Island high school graduates attend the state university. The new fund is expected to generate enough revenue to provide nearly 100 scholarships per year.
The scholarships will be awarded to applicants pursuing their undergraduate studies at Bryant University, Providence College, Rhode Island College, Roger Williams University, University of Rhode Island, or Community College of Rhode Island in three years after graduation from a high school in Rhode Island. school. The scholarships will be renewable for a maximum of three additional academic years.
The Andrews grew up in Providence, RI, and were commercial real estate investors. They both worked in banking at different times in their careers. Robert Andrew worked for Fleet Bank and later started several small businesses. Joyce Andrew worked for Citizen’s Bank in Providence until her retirement. She died in 2018 and he died in 2015.
Airbnb.org
The co-founders of online accommodation company Airbnb have together pledged to match up to $10 million in contributions from other donors to support the company’s efforts to provide free short-term housing to refugees fleeing Ukraine.
Brian Chesky, Joseph Gebbia Jr., and Nathan Blecharczyk and his wife, Elizabeth, have pledged to match donations through March 31, 2022, with the goal of housing up to 100,000 Ukrainian refugees. The non-profit arm of the company works with European agencies to connect refugees from Ukraine to housing. Gebbia appeared on the The Chronicle’s Philanthropy 50 list of the biggest donors of 2020 for donations he made to nonprofits seeking to help people struggling with homelessness.
Oregon Health and Science University
Norman and Linda Brenden donated $10 million to support research at the Brenden-Colson Center for Pancreatic Care and its efforts to develop new treatments for patients with pancreatic disease. Including this latest gift, the couple gave the center a total of $30 million.
Norman Brenden runs Colson & Colson Real Estate Development and Construction, in Salem, Oregon, and other companies. The Brenden-Colson Center for Pancreatic Care and Brenden’s business are named after William Colson, the late friend and business partner of Norman Brenden. Colson died of cancer in 2007.
University of Massachusetts at Amherst College of Engineering
Jérôme and Linda Paros donated $10 million to establish the Paros Atmospheric Research Center, the Paros Atmospheric Research and Hazard Mitigation Chair and the Paros Fellows/Scholars Endowment Fund for postgraduate and undergraduate scholarships.
Researchers supported by the Paroses grant will work on efforts to translate research into improved hazardous weather forecasts, warning systems and policies as the intensity and frequency of storms and other extreme weather events increase.
Jérôme Paros is a specialist in the field of geophysical measurements. He founded Paroscientific, Quartz Seismic Sensors and related companies in Redmond, Washington. He earned a bachelor’s degree in physics from the university in 1960.
To learn more about other major gifts, check out our regularly updated Donations of $1 Million or More database.
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