Donations to UCI Up 18% in Fiscal Year
UC Irvine received a total of $25.6 million in private donations for fiscal 1995-96, an 18% increase from the previous 12 months, officials reported last week.
The single largest gift to the university was by the Chao family of Orange County, who donated $2.4 million for cancer research and patient care.
Another gift of $1 million was given to the university by the Joan Irvine Smith and Athalie R. Clarke Foundation. That donation, dedicated to the new Reeve-Irvine Research Center to study spinal cord injuries, is contingent on the university raising another $2 million in the next 18 months.
The center is named for Irvine Smith and Christopher Reeve, the actor who suffered serious injury to his spine when he was thrown from a horse in 1995. The Reeve-Irvine center will be in the William J. Gillespie Neuroscience Research Facility, now under construction.
About $11.6 million, or half of the funds donated during the fiscal year, will be used by the university for medical research, officials said.
In addition, $4.1 million will be used for campus improvements; $3.9 million for student support; $3.3 million for academic support; $1.9 million for unrestricted gifts; and $830,000 for instruction purposes.
Jerry Mandel, the university’s vice chancellor for advancement, said donations are vital to research success, especially in this time of shrinking financial support from federal and state governments.
Mandel said the university’s fund-raising goal for fiscal 1996-97 is $30 million.
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