DePauw receives $200M in gifts to support strategic plan
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DePauw University has received $200 million in gifts it says will support its Bold and Gold 2027 strategic plan, the university announced Wednesday.
The funding includes $150 million from an anonymous donor, marking the largest gift ever given to the university, plus $50 million in supporting matches from several unnamed donors.
DePauw said about three-quarters of the funding will go to the university’s endowment, while about $64 million will be allocated to the new Creative School, which launches this fall as part of the Bold and Gold plan.
President Lori White told Inside INdiana Business that the gift is exciting for the university.
“It’s a huge endorsement and vote of confidence in the strategic direction of the university that we have articulated through our 2027 Bold and Gold strategic plan,” White said. “I’m just very excited for the DePauw community, all the things that we will be able to continue to do to deliver the incredible education experience that we’re known for.”
The Bold and Gold 2027 strategic plan was initiated in March 2022 and centers on four pillars: academic renewal, exemplary student experience, institutional equity and flourishing university.
As part of the academic renewal pillar, DePauw unveiled a three-school model, which includes the university’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, as well as the new School of Business and Leadership and the new Creative School.
The Creative School features on a multidisciplinary focus on technology, arts and media. Last June, the university announced Marcus Hayes as the inaugural dean of the Creative School.
White said the launch of the strategic plan has ignited the university’s alumni base because they see a “bold vision” for the future of DePauw. “And I think that’s evidenced by the $200 million gift that we announced today.”
The gift comes less than a month after Purdue University received its largest-ever gift in the form of a $100 million in grants from Indianapolis-based Lilly Endowment Inc. White said such large gifts are sending an important message.
“There has been a lot of talk nationally that the public is losing confidence in higher education,” she said. “I think what these gifts do is they reinforce that liberal arts colleges just like DePauw, public universities and other universities that have received significant gifts, we still have the power to transform lives.”
She said that message is particularly important to students and their families.
“In my own family, my parents were first generation college students, and as a result of their role modeling, my sisters and I are all college graduates, including two of us who have PhDs,” she said. “And so my parents earning a college degree changed the trajectory of their family, and that’s what we need to continue to communicate: that we do have the power to transform not only the lives of an individual student, but the lives of their families, and I think, the communities in which they reside.”
The new funding announced Wednesday builds on the two gifts totaling $40 million that DePauw received for the School of Business and Leadership. The business school officially opened last October.
DePauw said the $150 million gift surpassed the university’s previous record gift of $128 million that was awarded in 1999.