Recent News

A bequest from the estates of Richard Tunstead ’33CC and Mabel Tunstead to benefit Columbia College students and the faculty who teach them will generate more than $3 million to supplement a previous bequest distribution of $5 million made in late 2008. One-third of the more than $8 million total will benefit the Class of 1933 Scholarship Fund at Columbia College, while the remaining two-thirds has been directed by the dean of the College to support endowment for two chairs in the Arts and Sciences. The professorships — also named for the Class of 1933 — are not restricted to a single department; one is currently held by anthropology professor Michael Taussig, and the other by English professor Kauri Viswanathan.

The Tunsteads did not make large gifts during their lifetimes but decided to arrange for an estate gift after attending Mr. Tunstead’s 60th class reunion in 1993. A corporate attorney by trade, Mr. Tunstead planned for a gift of at least $1 million for College scholarships, adding a provision to support professorships if the estate proved larger than expected.

A bequest by Joseph M. Skrypski ’39CC has provided almost $3 million for financial aid endowment. The Skrypski Scholarship Fund will benefit students at Columbia College.

A bequest supplement from the estate of Sylvia Ashley will provide an additional $500,000 for scholarships for undergraduates who have been disadvantaged as a result of poverty or a physical handicap. This addition brings Ms. Ashley’s total bequest gift to more than $1.5 million.

Doppelmayr Seilbahnen GmbH, an Austrian company that manufactures cable-car and other ropeway systems, has made a $70,000 gift to support GSAPP SLUMLab’s urban transport project in South America. The gift will help to produce a workshop with students, an exhibition of its outcomes in Berlin, as well as a special publication dedicated to the project.

The David and Lucile Packard Foundation has made a pledge of $1,125,000 in support of the Coalition for Rainforest Nations Research Fund at Columbia University. The Coalition brings together talent from across government, academia, and industry to address the complex issues surrounding environmental sustainability specific to tropical rainforests. This gift allows the Coalition to move closer to its goal of achieving environmental and economic stability in today’s developing rainforest nations.

David ’78BUS and Barbara Zalaznick ’77JRN have completed a $3 million gift to endow the Barbara and David Zalaznick Professorship of Business, which is currently held by Patrick Bolton.

An anonymous donor to the Business School has made a $1 million gift for current use.

The Earth Institute received a generous year-end gift of $2.1 million from the William and Sue Gross Family Foundation to support the Millennium Villages project (MVP). This unrestricted support allows for crucial progress in all areas of the MVP. The Grosses have previously supported MVP by donating the proceeds of two stamp collections.

A $1.5 million grant from the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation and the Government of His Serene Highness the Sovereign Prince will support sustainable development in Mali. This grant will include participatory assessment and planning workshops with direct assistance for trials for improved water, soil and land management techniques as well as scaling-up projects in the Millennium Villages in Mali.

The Earth Institute received a $206,373 gift from Sight and Life, the nonprofit humanitarian initiative of DSM, a Swiss life and materials sciences company committed to fighting micronutrient deficiencies in developing countries. This new partnership will support the Center for Global Health and Economic Development’s work aimed at eliminating under-nutrition in the Millennium Villages of Sub-Saharan Africa. The gift will also include a donation of over a million micronutrient premix sachets.

An anonymous donor has given $500,000 in unrestricted support. Such gifts allow the Earth Institute to immediately address its most critical needs in several areas of research, education and outreach.

The Earth Institute received a $248,600 grant from The David and Lucile Packard Foundation for continued support of the International Nitrogen Initiative (INI), facilitated by the Tropical Agriculture and Rural Development Program and Cheryl Palm, the INI’s current chair. These funds will enable the INI to develop a revived strategy for a Global Nitrogen Assessment, assist its regional centers, and help support an EI post-doctoral fellow.

The Earth Institute received a $200,771 gift from an anonymous donor to support students from developing countries in the MS in Climate and Society or MPA in Environmental Studies programs. This gift will also fund seven Millennium Villages project summer internships.

Schlumberger-Doll Research has made an unrestricted gift of $180,000 to Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, which will be used to establish an FTIR (fourier transform infrared) mineralogical capability in the laboratory of Dr. Timothy Kenna. This approach offers the ability to quantitatively determine mineral composition and has been successfully used in petroleum research. Development of this capability at LDEO will allow its application to a variety of other fields within the earth sciences.

Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism will use $15 million in gifts to establish the Tow Center for Digital Journalism.

This amount includes a $5 million pledge made by the Tow Foundation in February 2008 to create a center dedicated to the teaching and research of professional journalism in digital and emerging media at the Journalism School. The foundation stipulated that its gift be matched by an additional $10 million from other sources within 24 months. The Journalism School recently met this goal with ten gifts, primarily from individuals, to support curriculum development and research, fellowships, faculty salaries, and operating expenses for the Center.

“We at the Graduate School of Journalism are profoundly grateful to the Tow family and to all the other supporters who have responded to their challenge by helping us to launch this important endeavor,” said Dean Nicholas Lemann. “At a time when our profession is undergoing fundamental change, these commitments will make it possible for the Journalism School to maximize the leadership role it has played ever since Joseph Pulitzer's establishing gift back in 1903."

The complete news release may be viewed here.

Recent gifts of note to the School of Social Work include $105,000 from Trustee Ann F. Kaplan ’72SW, ’77BUS, which will support research on complicated grief; $67,000 from the estate of Arthur W. Harrigan ’68LAW, ’70BUS, the spouse of Mrs. Margaret M. Harrigan ’41SW; $25,000 from Parallax Center, Inc., which has been directed by Dr. David M. Ockert ’81SW ’84SW to support intervention research; and $20,000 from Brenda Johnson Gallagher ’97SW in support of financial aid.

An anonymous donor has made a gift of 10 million rupees (about $200,000) to support Columbia’s new Global Center in Mumbai, India, which will open in late March.

As of January 1, more than $2.3 million had been raised for an endowed professorship honoring Mary O'Neil Mundinger, who will step down as Nursing dean in 2010 after 24 years of leadership. The Mundinger chair will be held by future deans of the School.

Generous commitments in support of the new chair include pledges of $250,000 apiece from Hilda Hodges Jones ’79NRS and Christopher S. Jones ’67LAW; Trustee Emeritus Michael E. Patterson ’67LAW and Elena Patterson; and an anonymous donor. Mary Dickey Lindsay ’45NRS has committed $148,000 and Sally Shipley Stone ’69NRS and Charles L. Stone, Jr. ’71PS, $100,000.

At an event to raise funds for the endowed professorship, tables were sponsored at the $100,000 level by Cell Therapeutics, Inc.; at the $50,000 level by Karen Katen, United Health Foundation, and a group comprised of the Honorable Thomas H. Kean ’63TC, ’88HON, Elizabeth McCormack, and William G. Spears; and at the $25,000 level by by Frannie Kelly Burns ’77NRS and Gordon M. Burns, Dorothy Simpson Dorion ’57NRS and Dr. George H. Dorion, Mary Turner Henderson ’64NRS and Craig Henderson ’70PS, New York-Presbyterian, and Joan Tompkins Wheeler ’46NRS.

CUMC will celebrate the opening of the David A. Gardner PET Brain Imaging Center with a ribbon-cutting ceremony this spring. The center was established through a $4 million gift from Lynn Shostack, pledged in 2005 and recently completed.

The Einhorn Family Trust made a pledge of $1.2 million to support the Brain/Gut Research Initiative. This is the Trust’s fourth annual commitment to the initiative.

The Mebane Charitable Foundation made a pledge of $1.2 million to the Department of Medicine’s Division of Digestive and Liver Diseases. The Foundation’s largesse will strengthen research and clinical care programs to mitigate the effects of gastrointestinal disorders.

The estate of Lyndon M. King, Jr. ’43PS, M.D., fulfilled a bequest of $743,334.

Roy Boelstler ’59DM, DDS, made contributions totaling more than $62,000 to establish the College of Dental Medicine Class of 1959 Scholarship Fund.

Ralph Kaslick ’59DM, DDS, made a pledge to establish the Dr. Ralph Kaslick and Jessica H. Kaslick Scholarship Fund, which will support a scholarship for CDM students pursuing a career in periodontics.