A roundup of notable gifts compiled by the Chronicle:
University of California at Los Angeles Health
Ronald Simms and Victoria Mann Simms pledged $18 million through their Simms/Mann Family Foundation to endow and expand the Simms/Mann-UCLA Center for Integrative Oncology.
The center provides psychosocial care to patients and families dealing with the emotional, psychological, and physical burdens of cancer and its treatment.
Ronald Simms is a commercial real-estate developer in Los Angeles. Victoria Mann Simms is a child-development specialist and former clinical psychologist.
Colby College
Jeff and Marieke Rothschild donated $16 million to support financial-aid efforts, arts programs, a new athletics and recreation center.
Of the total, $5 million will be directed to the Rothschild Family Endowed Financial Aid Fund, another $5 million will go toward the Gordon Center for Creative and Performing Arts, and $5 million will back the construction of the new center. The remaining $1 million will support the college’s annual fund.
Jeff Rothschild co-founded Veritas Software and led development of Facebook’s infrastructure platform as its founding vice president of engineering from 2005 to 2015.
University of North Carolina Department of Athletics
Jim and Jennifer Koman gave $15 million to back a new program aimed at preparing football players for life after graduation. The program and a new practice center will be named for Jim Komen’s late father, Bill, a UNC football player who graduated from in 1956.
Bill Koman went on to play professionally with the Baltimore Colts, the Philadelphia Eagles, and the St. Louis Cardinals and later founded a real-estate company. He died in 2019.
Jim Koman, 1986 UNC alumnus, founded ElmTree Funds, a private-equity real-estate company in St. Louis, and is president of the Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital in that city.
California State University at Fullerton
Nicholas and Lee Begovich committed $10 million to support faculty and student research in the fields of gravitational-wave, engineering, and computer science. As a result of the pledge, officials plan to name the university’s research center the Nicholas and Lee Begovich Center for Gravitational-Wave Physics and Astronomy.
The money will come from a collection of 15 postwar European sports cars valued at $10 million the couple plan to give the university to then sell. Once the university sells the collection, about $7 million will go toward gravitational-wave research in the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, and $3 million will be used to support a variety of programs in the College of Engineering and Computer Science.
Nicholas Begovich formerly served as a corporate vice president of Litton Industries and president of the Woodland Hills, Calif., aerospace company’s Data Systems division. Lee Begovich is an art historian who worked as a first-grade teacher early in her career.
San Francisco Opera
Tad and Dianne Taube pledged $6 million through Taube Philanthropies to endow the opera company’s general director position, which will be named for them.
Tad Taube founded the Woodmont Company, a commercial real-estate investment and management company based in Fort Worth. Early in his career he was chairman and CEO of Koracorp Industries, which merged with Levi Strauss in 1979. The couple are longtime donors to nonprofits in the Bay Area.
Arizona State University
Ernest Garcia II and his wife, Joanne, gave $3.6 million through their Garcia Family Foundation to back scholarships for students at Barrett, the Honors College, through 2028.
Ernest Garcia II is a former real-estate developer who owns DriveTime Automotive, a large used-car retailer, and is part owner of Carvana, an online platform for selling used cars and making auto loans that was founded by his son, Ernest Garcia III.
The couple launched the Garcia Family Foundation in 1996 primarily to help people struggling with poverty in Arizona.
To learn about other big donations, see our database of gifts of $1 million or more, which is updated throughout the week.
