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Santa Clara University’s Fundraising Campaign Reaches $400 Million Milestone


WEBWIRE

SANTA CLARA, Calif. - The largest fundraising campaign in Santa Clara University’s history celebrates its raising of more than $400 million. The Campaign included funds for scholarships, professorships, University centers and capital projects, including a new library and a new business school building. The University’s previous fundraising campaign, the Santa Clara Challenge in 1990-96, raised $134 million.

The total number of donors, 41,493, also set a University record. “Alumni, parents and friends made gifts, large and small, that will transform the University and impact how students and faculty interact and learn,” said SCU President Paul Locatelli, S.J. “By investing in the campus learning environment, our alumni and donors have helped move Santa Clara to a higher level of quality as a Jesuit, Catholic University.”

The Campaign kicked off in 2002 with a $25 million gift from Lorry I. Lokey, founder and president of San Francisco-based Business Wire, for scholarships and to rebuild and replace SCU’s library.

The Campaign ended with a $20 million gift from the Sobrato family, alumni and Silicon Valley real estate developers that would go toward the University’s new Learning Commons and Library. The Sobrato family had made earlier gifts to the Campaign totaling more than $10 million.

“The Learning Commons and Library is the most important facility to be built in my tenure as president at Santa Clara,” said Locatelli. The new Learning Commons and Library will be roughly twice the size of the current library. It will have the capacity to store 1.1 million volumes, approximately 20 years growth, with an automated retrieval system that will expand the library’s capacity to store and access well over a million volumes. Construction of the building began in summer of 2006 and will be completed by the start of the academic year in fall 2008.

The money raised through the Campaign will also have a direct effect on students through increased financial aid as the University exceeded its $101 million goal for student scholarships. “Approximately 70 percent of the University’s undergraduate students receive some form of financial aid,” said Jim Purcell, SCU’s vice president for University Relations. “Funds for scholarships were the largest single goal in the Campaign. We will continue to raise funds for scholarships because Santa Clara is committed to help families and students access a Jesuit education. The gifts will allow students to come to SCU who could not have attended without financial support. We are committed to educating leaders of competence, conscience, and compassion.”

The other major capital project in the Campaign is a new 84,000-square-foot business school building for SCU’s Leavey School of Business. The new building will be about 2 ½ times as large as the current building and will unite the business school classrooms, faculty offices, research centers, and executive education programs that are currently spread across campus.

Locatelli said that the two building projects represent the University’s commitment to excellence. “The library is the intellectual heart of the University, and the business school needs a 21st-century facility to continue to train ethical leaders for Silicon Valley and the world,” he said.

Officials noted that the University was the beneficiary of several unusually large gifts during the Campaign:

For the new Learning Commons and Library:

$20 million from the Sobrato family
$20 million from Lorry I. Lokey
$15 million from the Wayne and Gladys Valley Foundation
Multiple gifts of a million dollars or more from foundations, including Gellert, Hannon, and Koret
For the new Leavey School of Business building

$15 million from Donald L. Lucas
Several gifts of a million dollars or more from Silicon Valley corporations, including Bank of America and Cadence
For the Leavey Center

$15 million from the Leavey Foundation to rebuild the Leavey Center athletic facility



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