8 September 2014
New York Times : http://nyti.ms/1pFKAKv
Harvard University on Monday will announce the largest gift in its
history, $350 million to the School of Public Health, from a group
controlled by a wealthy Hong Kong family, one member of which earned
graduate degrees at the university.
Drew Gilpin Faust, Harvard’s president, said the gift by the
Morningside Foundation, directed to a relatively small part of the
university, would have a profound effect on the School of Public Health in
Boston, giving it a stable financial base and the ability to give students
more financial aid while expanding programs in several fields.
“It’s always been, as the whole field always is, under-resourced,” Dr.
Faust said. “It’s overwhelmingly dependent on money from federal grants
that are under threat.”
The foundation is led by two brothers, Ronnie and Gerald Chan,
whose businesses include the Hang Lung Group, a major developer of
real estate in Hong Kong and elsewhere in China, and the Morningside
Group, a private equity and venture capital firm. The School of Public
Health will be renamed for their father, T. H. Chan, who founded Hang
Lung.
Only six larger donations have been made to an American institution
of higher education, according to a list by The Chronicle of Higher
Education. Those include a $400 million gift by Eli and Edythe Broad to
the Broad Institute, a joint arm of Harvard and the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology. The Chans’ gift is the largest to Harvard alone.
In keeping with university practice, Harvard did not disclose the
timing or form of the gift. Large donations are often spread over several
years, and can consist of securities or real estate, in addition to cash.
Harvard officials said the gift would be used to address four broad
areas: pandemics, which they define to include threats like obesity and
cancer; harmful environments, ranging from pollution to violence;
poverty and humanitarian crises; and failing health systems. Dr. Faust
cited the Ebola outbreak in West Africa as an example of the need for
such resources, hitting on three of those four areas — a rapidly spreading
disease, abetted by poverty, that existing health systems cannot handle.
“We’re all realizing how important public health is as we become
more global and diseases are shared across boundaries,” she said.
Gerald Chan earned a master’s degree in medical radiological
physics and a doctorate in radiation biology at the School of Public
Health in the 1970s, worked as a research fellow at the Dana-Farber
Cancer Institute and published several scientific papers. He has remained
an active alumnus of the school, judging student competitions and giving
speeches there, including the commencement address in 2012.
In 1986, he joined his brother in creating the Morningside Group,
and he is a director of Hang Lung, where Ronnie Chan is the chairman.
The family’s philanthropic efforts have focused on promoting science and
higher education, including endowing a professorship at the School of
Public Health.
Recently, Gerald Chan has drawn attention for his real estate
purchases in the Harvard Square area of Cambridge, Mass., near the
university’s main campus.