A roundup of notable gifts compiled by the Chronicle:
University of California at Irvine
Henry and Susan Samueli gave $50 million to create three multidisciplinary research institutes in the Henry Samueli School of Engineering. The three institutes will together be known as “Engineering+” and will include a center focused on engineering and health, one on engineering and society, and another on engineering and the environment.
A portion of the gift will be used to establish the Office of Inreach, which will work to ensure the well-being, academic success, sense of belonging, and career opportunities for undergraduate students in the engineering school.
Henry Samueli co-founded the semiconductor corporation Broadcom. He also serves as an adjunct professor in the university’s electrical engineering and computer-science department. The Samuelis have given extensively to the university. In 2017, they pledged $200 million to create the Susan & Henry Samueli College of Health Sciences. In addition, they gave $20 million for the Henry Samueli School of Engineering in 1999, and they donated $5.7 million to establish the Susan Samueli Center for Integrative Medicine in 2001.
Bob Woodruff Foundation and Blue Star Families
Craig Newmark pledged $100 million through his Craig Newark Philanthropies to help military veterans, current service members, and their families and caregivers. The two organizations will lead the effort and use the money to award grants to a range of nonprofits seeking to help veterans and military families access mental-health and suicide-prevention services and address homelessness and food insecurity.
The grants will also go toward nonprofits that help veterans access education and jobs in cybersecurity and support advocacy efforts to improve public policies aimed at helping veterans and their families.
Newmark founded the classified-advertising website Craigslist. He has devoted huge sums to charity in recent years, appearing on the Chronicle’s annual Philanthropy 50 list of the biggest donors four times since 2018. He has focused much of his giving on supporting efforts to protect election integrity, journalism ethics, security, and cybersecurity, and helping veterans and their families.
University of Nebraska Foundation
Barbara and Wally Weitz pledged $25 million gift to support various programs at two institutions: the University of Nebraska at Omaha and the Nebraska College of Technical Agriculture. Of the total pledged, the couple are directing $14 million to establish the Weitz Innovation and Excellence Fund, which will be used to expand a range of programs at the University of Nebraska, and $5 million to endow a chair in higher-education leadership at the university.
They are directing $6 million toward renovating and expanding the Barn, a historic building at the Nebraska College of Technical Agriculture that was constructed in 1917. When completed, it will serve as a student center.
Wally Weitz founded Weitz Investment Management, a financial firm in Omaha. Before launching the firm in 1983, he worked as a financial analyst and portfolio manager at Chiles, Heider & Company and as a security analyst at G.A. Saxon & Company. Barbara Weitz is a retired faculty member at the UNO’s Grace Abbott School of Social Work and serves on the University of Nebraska Board of Regents.
Providence College
Madeleine Mondor gave $10 million to help pay for the construction of a building to house the college’s new School of Nursing and Health Sciences. The building will be named for the donor’s late husband, Bernard Georges (Ben) Mondor, and is scheduled for completion in January 2025.
Ben Mondor owned the Pawtucket Red Sox, a minor league baseball team in Pawtucket, R.I. He served in the U.S. Navy in World War II and went on to work in the textile industry. He eventually owned textile mills in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and elsewhere. In 1973, he sold his companies and retired. He was widely credited with reinvigorating the Pawtucket Red Sox after buying it in 1977 and saving it from bankruptcy. He owned the team until he died at in 2010 at 85. Madeleine Mondor then took over ownership of the team and sold it to a group of investors in 2015.
University of Pennsylvania
Marc and Robin Wolpow gave $10 million through their Arbour Way Foundation to establish the Robin S. Wolpow and Marc B. Wolpow Fund for Healthcare Entrepreneurship at Venture Lab, the university’s student entrepreneurship center. The new fund will back programs on health care discoveries and co-curricular education and collaboration efforts across the university.
Marc Wolpow co-founded and is co-CEO of Audax Group, a venture-capital and private-equity firm in Boston. He earned a bachelor’s degree from the university’s Wharton School in 1980.
Erikson Institute
John and Kathy Schreiber gave $6 million to support financial aid for graduate students from diverse backgrounds who are pursuing a master’s degree in early-childhood education, child development, and social work. The gift will also support the institute’s teacher-education master’s degree program. The Schreibers stipulated that aid recipients must serve young children in underserved communities for at least four years after they graduate.
John Schreiber retired in 2015 as a partner and co-founder of Blackstone Real Estate Advisors, where he had overseen the New York investment firm’s real-estate holdings since 1992. The couple have given extensively to charities in the Lake County, Ill., region and in Chicago. They appeared on the Chronicle’s annual Philanthropy 50 list of the biggest donors for giving $100 million to Loyola University Chicago and other gifts they gave in 2022.
To learn about other big donations, see our database of gifts of $1 million or more, which is updated regularly.
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