| 1. | National U. system | T. Denny Sanford | chairman of United National Corporation, the holding company of First Premier Bank and Premier Bankcard, in South Dakota | $100 million | expansion of the system’s nationwide Sanford Harmony social-emotional learning program aimed at helping children in preschool through sixth grade to form strong relationships and to avoid abuse, bullying behavior, and, later, divorce |
| 2. | United Lutheran Seminary | Anonymous | The donor, who died this year, made the gift in honor of the Rev. James Franklin Kelly, a Lutheran minister who graduated from the seminary, in Gettysburg, Pa., in 1920, and his wife, Hope Anna Eyster Kelly. The Rev. Kelly died in 1983, and his wife died in 1973. | $30 million | endowment of a new faculty chair and student scholarships |
| 3. | City U. of New York, Graduate School of Journalism | Craig Newmark | founder of the classified-advertising website Craigslist and the Craig Newmark Philanthropies | $20 million | fund for an endowment for the school, which will be renamed the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York |
| 4. | Wichita State U. Foundation | I. Wayne and Kay Woolsey | Wayne Woolsey is founder and chairman of Woolsey Companies, an oil and natural-gas exploration and production business, and Kay Woolsey is vice president and secretary of the company. Their son Marc is a Wichita State graduate. | $12 million (pledge) | $10 million to help construct a new building for the W. Frank Barton School of Business, which will be called the Wayne and Kay Woolsey Hall, and $2 million to support students’ field excursions and the geology-petroleum program in the geology department |
| 4. | Worcester Polytechnic Institute | Anonymous | Worcester Polytechnic alumnus | $12 million (pledge) | unrestricted use; the money will be put toward the university’s endowment |
| 6. | American Society of the U. of Haifa | Lorry I. Lokey | Lorry Lokey is the founder and chairman emeritus of Business Wire, a news-distribution company in San Francisco, which he sold to Berkshire Hathaway in 2006. | $10 million | support for construction of a new downtown campus of the university in the port area of Haifa, Israel |
| 6. | John Carroll U. | Boler Family Foundation (John M. and Mary Jo Boler) | The Boler family runs the Boler Company, which has holdings in the truck-parts manufacturing industry. The company was founded by John M. Boler, a 1956 John Carroll graduate who died in 2016. It is now led by his son Matthew. | $10 million | establishment of the John M. and Mary Jo Boler College of Business, a transformed version of the Boler School of Business, which will include two new schools: the School of Accountancy and Information Science, and the School of Leadership and Social Innovation |
| 6. | U. of Notre Dame | Wilson Sheehan Foundation (Christopher and Lorraine Sheehan Wilson) | Christopher Wilson is a senior partner at the hedge fund Stonehill Capital Management. The couple met while attending Notre Dame in the 1980s. | $10 million | support for the Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities, a research center in the economics department that aims to reduce poverty in the United States |
| 6. | U. of Virginia | Jane Batten | widow of Frank Batten, founder of Landmark Communications, which owned the Weather Channel and Weather.com, along with many news channels and newspapers that are still owned by its successor company; he died in 2009 | $10 million | support for the new Batten Family Bicentennial Scholars Fund, to help graduate students in the master-of-public-policy program at the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy |
| 6. | Western Kentucky U. | Jerry E. Baker Foundation (Jerry Baker) | Jerry Baker, who died last year at age 86, was a former owner of the industrial-gases company Southern Welding Supply and later an executive at Airgas Mid America, which bought his company, in Bowling Green, Ky. | $10 million (bequest) | endowment of a scholarship fund for students who major or minor in music, dance, theater, art, or horticulture |
| 11. | U. of Kansas | Lavon Brosseau | Brosseau, who died in 2016 at the age of 88, was a retired high-school teacher in Concordia, Kan. With her late husband, Jack, she owned a large parcel of farmland that comprised the bulk of her estate. They also owned a small glass company. | $7.4 million (bequest) | endowment for scholarships for students majoring in the arts, humanities, and education |
| 12. | U. of Virginia School of Nursing | Bedford Falls Foundation (William E. and Joanne Barkett Conway) | William E. Conway Jr. is a co-founder and co-chief executive officer of the Carlyle Group, a private-equity firm in Washington. | $5 million | expansion of scholarship support for students across the school’s undergraduate and graduate nursing programs |
| 12. | Washington U. School of Medicine in St. Louis | George and Carol Bauer | George Bauer, an emeritus trustee and a 1953 and 1959 alumnus of Washington University, is a retired IBM executive and founder of the investment banking firm the GPB Group Ltd. | $5 million | endowment of a deanship for the School of Medicine |
| 14. | U. of California at Los Angeles School of Law | Emmett Family Foundation (Dan and Rae Emmett) | Dan Emmett is chairman of Douglas Emmett Inc., a real-estate company based in Santa Monica, Calif. | $4.3 million | support for students and the expansion of faculty research at the Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment |
| 15. | Loras College | The Rev. William Wilkie | Father Wilkie was a priest and history professor at Loras who earned a bachelor’s degree in history and fine arts from the college in 1950. He died last year at age 87. | $3.2 million (bequest) | endowment for the William E. Wilkie Liturgical Program, William E. Wilkie Double Major Scholarship, Wilkie Classic Film Collection Fund, Professor William Green Senior History Award, Monsignor William D. Green Award, and the Roger Rechenmacher Scholarship Award for Creativity |
