Billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott announced Tuesday that she is giving away $2.7 billion to 30 colleges across the country.
This is Scott’s third round of donations after she donated $6 billion in similar contributions to several smaller colleges, including HBCUs, as well as for pandemic relief and a number of other social, equity, and justice causes.
The latest donation will be distributed among “286 high-impact organizations that have been historically underfunded and overlooked,” including 30 colleges and universities from all over the country.
“Higher education is a proven pathway to opportunity, so we looked for two- and four-year institutions successfully educating students who come from communities that have been chronically underserved,” Scott wrote in her Medium post titled “Seeding by Ceding.”
Please spread the word about these remarkable teams (and when you do please help shift the culture by making them the subject of your story or comments) https://t.co/z6H2bXAtn2
— MacKenzie Scott (@mackenziescott) June 15, 2021
Colleges That Made the List
Scott’s blog post lists the 286 institutions that made the list although she did not specify the amount donated to each of them. In addition to well-known arts organizations such as Ballet Hispano and the Apollo Theatre, institutions of higher education, such as the University of California and the University of Texas also featured in her list.
The University of Texas (UT) at San Antonio and Rio Grande Valley, Amarillo College, and San Jacinto College will receive millions of dollars each to boost student enrollment, retention, and graduation.
UT San Antonio, which received $40 million, said the “gift is completely transformational” and will support “students from communities with significant educational attainment and income disparities.”
This round also included a number of record-setting donations to institutions such as the University of Florida, Florida International University, a dozen community colleges in California, Illinois, and Texas, the American Indian College Fund, and the American Indian Higher Education Consortium — many of which said the gift was the largest in their history.
In her blog post, Scott said she is troubled by the concentration of wealth in the hands of a chosen few and is looking “to de-emphasize privileged voices and cede focus to others” through her latest gift.
“Discrimination against ethnic and religious minorities has been deepening,” she wrote, adding her team of researchers assessed organizations that are “bridging divides through interfaith support and collaboration.”