$10 Million Gift Boosts Humanities at Ohio Community College

Cuyahoga Community College in Cleveland has received $10 million from the philanthropic Mandel family’s foundations to establish a campus center devoted to the liberal arts and nurturing civic engagement, The Plain Dealer writes. The gift funds a permanent endowment for the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Humanities Center and a chair for a dean to lead the facility, which will host classes, seminars, lectures, and special events.

The donation came from the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Foundation, established by the industrialist brothers in the 1950s, and the Mandel Supporting Foundations. Community colleges receive only a sliver of overall philanthropic support for higher education and have struggled to boost fundraising. The Mandel foundation has long supported a leadership program for faculty and staff at Cuyahoga, and LaGuardia Community College in New York received an unrestricted $2.2-million gift earlier this week from banking giant Goldman Sachs.