Northeastern U. Nets $50 Million for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics: Gifts Roundup

A roundup of notable gifts compiled by the Chronicle:

Northeastern University

Amin and Julie Khoury gave their alma mater $50 million to endow the newly renamed Khoury College of Computer and Information Sciences. Their gift will advance the university’s programs in artificial intelligence, machine learning, robotics, and cybersecurity.

Amin Khoury co-founded B/E Aerospace, where he serves as executive chairman, and also created several other businesses in the scientific-equipment industry. He holds three degrees from the university: bachelor’s and master’s degrees in chemistry and a master’s of business administration. Julie Khoury earned an MBA at Northeastern.

Artificial intelligence has become an increasingly important cause for many of America’s wealthiest donors, according to a Chronicle tally.

Houston Baptist University

Sherry and Jim Smith Sr. have donated $20 million to build classroom and laboratory space at the College of Engineering, the College of Science and Mathematics, and the School of Nursing and Allied Health.

Jim Smith founded Smith & Company, a commercial real-estate development firm in Houston.

His father, Orrien, was among the 25 founders of the university who made gifts to purchase the campus’s land in 1958.

University of Vermont

Rich and Deb Tarrant gave $15 million to build a multipurpose center for the university’s men’s and women’s basketball programs, as well as space for academic, cultural, and entertainment events.

Rich Tarrant co-founded IDX Systems Corporation, a health-care technology company that he sold to General Electric in 2006. Deb Tarrant is the mayor of Hillsboro Beach, Fla.

Three of the couple’s sons graduated from the university.

University of Kansas

A $6.9 million bequest from a petroleum geologist and his wife will pay for research on early human life in the Central Great Plains and western portions of the Midwest.

Joseph and Maude Ruth Cramer originally established the university’s Odyssey Archaeological Research Fund with a $1 million donation in 2002. Joseph Cramer died in 2013, and Maude Ruth Cramer died earlier this year.

Duke University

The university’s Lilly Library has received two gifts totaling $5 million from two nieces of Ruth Lilly, for whom the library was named in 1993. Ruth Lilly was the last surviving great-grandchild of pharmaceutical magnate Eli Lilly; she died in 2009.

William and Irene McCutchen gave $2.5 million, and Virginia and Peter Nicholas donated another $2.5 million. The money will pay to renovate the library and protect its Georgian edifice, which is original to the 1927 building.

The Nicholases previously gave $70 million to Duke in 2004 for its School of the Environment, which is now named for them.

Harvard Medical School

Perry Cohen and his family have given $1.5 million for the Sexual and Gender Minorities Health Equity Initiative, which will train Harvard medical students and faculty clinicians to provide better and holistic health care for patients who are transgender or nonbinary.

Cohen, a transgender man, is the founder of the Venture Out Project, a nonprofit organization that takes LGBTQ people on guided wilderness tours. His father, Richard Cohen, is the billionaire owner of C&S Wholesale Grocers, where Perry Cohen previously worked as vice president for leadership development and talent management.

Lansing Community College

The Michigan community college received a $1.5 million bequest from Christian Herrmann Jr. for scholarships and student support.

Herrmann died in California in 2017 at the age of 96. He spent 63 years as a faculty member at the University of California at Los Angeles and served as chair of the department of neurology. He was born and raised in Lansing, and in 1995, he donated his childhood home to become the community college’s presidential residence.

To learn about other big donations, see our database of gifts of $1 million or more, which is updated throughout the week.