California State University, Northridge’s College of Arts, Media and Communication received a $52,000 endowment from real estate investor Robert Barbera to support performances by music students. The endowment will be used to underwrite performances by the college’s major music ensembles, including the symphony orchestra, wind ensemble, Jazz A Band and the Northridge Singers.
The College of Charleston (S.C.) received a $2.5 million grant from the Samuel Freeman Charitable Trust to establish the School of Languages, Cultures and World Affairs on campus.
Columbia Law School (N.Y.) received a $3.2 million gift from Alphonse Fletcher Jr., chairman and CEO of Fletcher Asset Management. The gift will endow a professorship in race and social justice issues. Jack Greenberg, former director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, will hold the initial professorship.
Cornell University (N.Y.) received a $25 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to support the construction of the 100,000-square-foot William H. Gates Hall. The $50 million facility will hold a lecture hall, faculty offices, classrooms, laboratories, student project spaces and conference rooms.
Furman University (S.C.) received a $3 million grant from the Marshall E. Rinker Sr. Foundation to construct, furnish and endow the north hall of the university’s planned new science complex. The section of the complex will be the main entry for the building and will be called the Marshall E. and Vera Lea Rinker Hall.
Pennsylvania State University received a $300,000 gift from Barnes & Noble to co-sponsor the Penn State Forum Speaker Series. The lunchtime series features leaders and policymakers from several different fields and is modeled after the National Press Club’s Speaker Series.
Prince George’s Community College (Md.) received $23,100 from the Verizon Foundation for Technology as part of the college’s Changing Lives-Building Communities campaign. The donation will provide technology equipment for PGCC’s new High Technology Center.
Southern University (La.) received a $50,000 grant from 3M Corporation to help the department of management, marketing and e-business develop a role play exercise laboratory where students can record and critique simulated sales encounters.
The University of Alabama at Birmingham received a $5 million gift from W. Cobb Hazelrig to help finance the construction of the Hazelrig-Salter Radiation Oncology Facility. The building, which will be located at the university’s Comprehensive Cancer Center, is named after Hazelrig’s parents, J. William and Virginia, and their longtime friends, Paul and Merle Salter.
The University of Chicago received a $42 million gift from Gary C. Comer, founder of the Lands’ End clothing company, and his wife, Frances. The gift, the largest single donation in the university’s history, will be used to establish a pediatric care center and will support recruitment programs in pediatric medicine.
The University of Florida’s College of Engineering received a $10 million gift from J. Crayton Pruitt Sr., a surgeon and inventor. The gift from Pruitt, who received a heart transplant from the university in 1995, will be used to support faculty members, research, technology and academic programs in the biomedical engineering department. The university also received a $1 million grant from the A.J. Spiegel Foundation to fund a pharmaceutical research program for graduate students.
The University of Pittsburgh received land valued at approximately $7 million from Allen Cook, a rancher in Wheatland, Wyo. The land contains dinosaur fossil beds, which the university plans to use to supplement the studies of its anthropology, paleontology and environmental studies students.
Wheeling Jesuit University (W.Va.) received a $700,000 grant from the BB&T Charitable Foundation to support the university’s business curriculum. The grant, one of the largest in the university’s history, will be used to teach theories of free-market capitalism and objectivism in WJU’s MBA program.
Yale University (Conn.) has been awarded a $5.4 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to fund research on the epidemiological and immunological aspects of cutaneous leishmaniasis in Columbia. The parasitic disease is found primarily in children, and reported cases in 2003 nearly doubled the 2002 numbers.
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