A roundup of notable gifts compiled by the Chronicle:
Cranbrook Academy of Art
Dan and Jennifer Gilbert gave $30 million for financial aid and diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts. Those include creating and endowing the Gilbert Fellows program, which will pay the full tuition for students from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups, and shoring up the academy’s existing scholarship fund so the institution can provide financial aid to more students.
The money will also support visiting faculty artists program for artists of color; back inclusion, diversity, equity, and access consultants to develop and implement plans to make the academy more inclusive; support Cranbrook Art Museum’s projects by diverse artists; and pay for new programs to help the academy strengthen its financial security and reduce its reliance on tuition for its funding.
Dan Gilbert founded Rocket Companies and the mortgage lender Quicken Loans, as well as Rock Family of Companies, a portfolio of technology businesses and real-estate investments. He is the chairman of the Cleveland Cavaliers, a professional basketball team.
Jennifer Gilbert founded and serves as the creative director of Pophouse, a commercial design firm in Detroit that specializes in using data and industry research in its design practices, and Amber Engine, a home-furnishings services and technology company.
Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
Philip Van Horn Gerdine donated $16 million, of which $10 million will be used to establish the Philip and Marjorie Gerdine Precision Medicine Scholars Fund enabling six to eight scholars to pursue experimental approaches to their research in precision medicine, a type of health care that tailors treatments to individual patients’ specific needs.
Of the remainder of the gift, $3 million is directed to the Wilmer Eye Institute to create the Philip and Marjorie Gerdine Professorship of Ophthalmology for the Cornea Division, and $3 million will endow the Philip and Marjorie Gerdine Professorship of Ophthalmology for Age-Related Macular Degeneration Research.
Gerdine has held a number of executive posts at Boston Consulting Group, PriceWaterhouseCoopers, General Electric, and others. He has been a patient at the Wilmer Eye Institute, as had his late wife, Marjorie, a clinical psychologist and psychology professor at the University of Rhode Island. She died in 2019.
Southern Methodist University Cox School of Business
Bryan and Sharoll Sheffield gave $15 million to build Bryan S. Sheffield Hall, a new building that will house the Cox School’s Bachelor of Business Administration program’s admissions, academic advising and student records offices, as well as classrooms and faculty offices.
Bryan Sheffield founded and is managing partner of Formentera Partners, an energy-focused investment firm in Austin, Tex. He also founded Parsley Energy, an oil and gas company. He earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from the university in 2001.
Ashland University
Robert and Jan Archer gave more than $10 million to support four-year scholarships for students and to back athletics, marketing efforts, and other programs.
Robert Archer is a former owner and retired chief executive of Kent Watersports, a sporting-goods company in New London, Ohio, that was acquired by Seawall Capital, a private-equity firm in Boston, earlier this year.
Jan Archer is a retired nonprofit executive. She led the United Way of Ashland County as well as Ashland Leadership, a community leadership-development program in Ashland, Ohio.
Los Angeles Opera
Jerry and Terri Kohl gave $5 million to underwrite the opera company’s orchestra and its efforts to return to performing.
The money, a challenge gift aimed at helping to raise money from other donors, will assist the 62 core orchestra members and some of the orchestra’s additional musicians who have been sidelined because of pandemic closures. It will also back the orchestra’s return later this summer in the opera’s outdoor performances.
The Kohls founded Brighton Collectibles, an accessories manufacturer and retailer, in Los Angeles. They are longtime donors to cultural institutions in Los Angeles.
University of Southern Mississippi Foundation
Lamar Powell left $3.1 million to create the Lamar W. Powell Scholarship Endowment, which will provide incoming freshmen a four-year scholarship. The first cohort of freshmen will begin this fall, and over time, the donation will grow to provide scholarships for 80 students annually.
Powell spent 23 years of his career in U.S. Army and later worked for the U.S. Department of State. The bulk of his fortune came from private investments in the stock market that he made over many decades. He died in 2015.
To learn about other big donations, see our database of gifts of $1 million or more, which is updated regularly.