February 3, 2020 | Read Time: 3 minutes
A roundup of notable gifts compiled by the Chronicle:
Northeastern University
David and Barbara Roux pledged $100 million to launch the Roux Institute, a new graduate education and research campus in Portland, Me., that is scheduled to open later this year.
David Roux co-founded Silver Lake Partners, a private-equity firm, and early in his career, Datex, the first commercial CD-ROM publishing company. He formerly held executive posts at Liberate Technologies and Oracle Corporation.
Programs at the institute will focus on the practical application of artificial intelligence and machine learning in the digital and life sciences to prepare people for high-demand jobs and drive research.
University of Texas at Austin
The billionaires Michael and Susan Dell pledged $100 million through their Dell Foundation for a program aimed at closing the gap in college-graduation rates across income levels.
The money will go toward expanding individualized support services for all Pell-eligible students at UT Austin and additional financial support for those students who need it.
Michael Dell attended the university but dropped out when he was 19 to go into business building and upgrading personal computers and eventually creating the computer company that would later become Dell Technologies.
University of California at Los Angeles
Anthony and Jeanne Pritzker committed $30 million through their Anthony and Jeanne Pritzker Family Foundation to renovate a building in the psychology department. The building will be named for the donors.
Anthony Pritzker is an heir to the Hyatt hotels fortune and managing partner of the Pritzker Group investment firm. His father, Donald Pritzker, founded the Hyatt hotel chain. Anthony Pritzker is not a UCLA alumnus, but co-chaired the university’s recent capital campaign.
Jeanne Pritzker founded Foster Care Counts, a charity that works to raise awareness of the struggles foster children face both while they are in the foster-care system and when they age out of it.
Indiana University Kelley School of Business
Sheila Jellison and her daughters gave $16 million through the family’s Brian and Sheila Jellison Family Foundation to create high-tech studios that will provide online students in the Kelley Direct M.B.A. and M.S. degree programs and the school’s Executive Degree Programs the experience of being in a live classroom.
The money will also be used to create a financial-literacy course series, as well as a program to help freshman business students identify their strengths and interests.
Jellison is the widow of Brian Jellison, an IU alumnus who led Roper Technologies, which designs software and other products, from 2001 until his death in 2018.
Museum of the Redlands
Jack and Laura Dangermond donated $3 million to help pay for a big expansion project.
The Dangermonds usually don’t attach their names to their gifts, but in 2017 the couple caught the attention of the philanthropy world when they donated $165 million to the Nature Conservancy, to buy and preserve an eight-mile coastal region in Santa Barbara County, Calif.
Together they founded Environmental Systems Research Institute, a digital-mapping company.
Morehouse College
Ken and Kathryn Chenault donated $1 million, half of which will go toward the Dr. Hortenius Chenault Endowed Chair in Math and Science and the other half will support the restoration of the college’s Martin Luther King Jr. International Chapel. The professorship is named for Ken Chenault’s late father, a Morehouse alumnus.
Ken Chenault is chairman and managing director of General Catalyst Partners, a venture-capital firm. He served as chairman and chief executive of American Express from 2001 until he retired from that post in 2018. Kathryn Chenault is a former lawyer.
Spelman College
Joan Johnson left $1 million to back scholarships for students majoring in STEM fields and to help pay for classroom renovations.
Johnson, who died last year at 89, co-founded Johnson Products, one of the first hair-care brands developed for African Americans and the first Black-owned business traded on the American Stock Exchange.
To learn about other big donations, see our database of gifts of $1 million or more, which is updated throughout the week.
