Archives — 2004

Kyriakos Tsakopoulos, a prominent businessman and attorney from Roseville, Calif., presented Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger a check for $1 million to establish a chair in Hellenic Studies. The donation was made as a tribute to Mr. Tsakopoulos’ late grandfather—for whom he is named—and to focus study on the timeless relevance of the teachings of the great Greek philosopher Aristotle.

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In a letter to the Columbia University community, President Lee C. Bollinger announced a gift of $15 million from University Trustee Gerry Lenfest (Law ’58) to the Earth Institute at Columbia. Provided through the Lenfest Foundation, the gift will endow the first Earth Institute professorship, promote sustainable development, and advance solutions to two of the most pressing problems of our time: global climate change and acute global poverty.

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Columbia University recently announced that it is establishing the world’s first chair in modern Tibetan studies. The Leila Hadley Luce Professorship is made possible by a $3 million award from the Henry Luce Foundation. The chair will be based in the University’s interdisciplinary East Asian Languages and Cultures Department, already a leading center for the study of China, Japan, and Korea. The chair is named after Leila Hadley Luce, an author and explorer who has long supported Tibetan culture. She is the author of many travel books, including Give Me the World, Journey with Elsa Cloud, and How to Travel with Children in Europe, among others.

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