newjerseynewsroom.com

Gift helps propel state university to raise a record $137.4 million in 2010-11

BY TOM HESTER SR.

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

A $27 million gift from an anonymous donor – the largest in Rutgers University’s history – helped propel the school to raise a record $137.4 million in private donations during the 2010-11 academic year, the Rutgers University Foundation announced Wednesday.

The $27 million gift is structured as a challenge grant that will establish 18 new endowed chairs in a wide range of academic disciplines, including business education and the sciences. For every $1.5 million that is raised for an endowed chair that meets the gift’s criteria, the donor will match the gift with an additional $1.5 million. A total endowment of $3 million is needed to create an academic chair.

“Endowed chairs provide permanent sources of funding for faculty positions, enabling the university to attract and retain internationally acclaimed leaders in high-priority academic fields,” Rutgers Foundation President Carol P. Herring said. “This is an exceptional opportunity for our university. Endowed chairs are among the highest priorities of our fundraising campaign, because they enable the university to recruit and retain faculty who will provide Rutgers undergraduate and graduate students with the highest levels of instruction and research opportunities.”

To date, the anonymous donor has given a total of $40 million to support Rutgers initiatives as part of “Our Rutgers, Our University," the university's $1 billion fundraising campiagn. The campaign addresses critical needs across all areas of the university – including faculty research, student support and campus facilities.

More than 90 percent of the 2010-11 fundraising will support academic programs and initiatives that directly benefit students, Rutgers President Richard L. McCormick said.

“We are grateful to the more than 56,000 donors who have supported Rutgers University over the past year, despite the chronic economic challenges that plague our nation, McCormick said. “These generous individuals and institutions clearly share our belief that private financial support for Rutgers University is a sound investment that will continue to pay dividends for the people of New Jersey for decades to come.”

Other notable gifts from the past year include:

• An anonymous $10 million donation to support the New Jersey Institute for Food, Nutrition and Health. The institute will build on the university’s extensive work in the fields of agriculture food science, nutrition science and human health, with a focus on society’s pressing challenges in cardio-inflammatory disease, cancer and obesity.

• A $6 million pledge from alumnus Mir Imran (Engineering 1977) to support academic initiatives in the School of Engineering. Half of this pledge, $3 million, will support the Mir Imran Endowed Chair in Bioengineering. Another $1.5 million will support the Imran Family Scholarship to benefit undergraduate engineering students. The remaining $1.5 million will go to the Imran Fund for the School of Engineering, which will create a dean’s discretionary fund for faculty research.

• $5 million from alumnus John J. Byrne Jr. (Rutgers College 1954) to support the Byrne Family First-Year Seminar Program, which connects prominent faculty with first-year students. Each of these small, one-credit courses is limited to 20 students. This academic year, nearly 3,000 Rutgers first-year students are expected to participate in Byrne seminars.

• A $3.4 million pledge from Rutgers College alumna Marlene A. Tepper and her husband, David A. Tepper, to the Mason Gross School of the Arts. The donation stipulates $3 million to establish for the first endowed faculty chair at the school, in the Visual Arts Department. The remaining $400,000 is earmarked for scholarships in the painting program.