UCF gets $40 million from Scott
Billionaire’s gift the largest in university history
MacKenzie Scott, the billionaire philanthropist, has given $40 million to the University of Central Florida — an investment the school said was the “largest gift in the university’s history.”
UCF described the donation from Scott and her husband Dan Jewett as an “unrestricted gift,” which the university plans to use to “focus on fostering social mobility while developing the skilled talent needed to advance industry across our state and beyond.”
“We are honored by Ms. Scott and Mr. Jewett’s trust and confidence in the University of Central Florida,” UCF President Alexander N. Cartwright said in a statement issued by the school. “Their transformational gift validates the work of our faculty and staff to foster student success and these funds will enable us to further increase our impact for generations of students. This unrestricted investment will accelerate our trajectory toward becoming the world’s leading public metropolitan research university and inspire others to invest in building a better future for our students and society.”
The gift will primarily fund programs through UCF’s endowment, including scholarships, research and partnerships.
UCF was far from alone in receiving large-scale gifts from Scott on Tuesday. On her blog, she announced $2.74 billion would be distributed to 286 organizations, including universities, arts nonprofits and groups fighting racial discrimination.
Leaders at Florida International University announced on Tuesday that the South Florida school also was tapped to receive a $40 million gift from Scott. Broward College was on the list of organizations selected to receive donations, but
it is not clear how much the school expects to receive. Scott did not disclose the value of the gifts on her blog.
“Higher education is a proven pathway to opportunity, so we looked for 2- and 4-year institutions successfully educating students who come from communities that have been chronically underserved,” Scott wrote.
About 19% of UCF students are first-generation students, which means neither of their parents have degrees, according to the school’s website. And in 2019-20, more than 7,500 recipients of Pell grants, federal awards for low-income students, completed their bachelor’s degrees at UCF.
Eliminating barriers for students of all backgrounds and incomes has been a decadelong focus for UCF and the school has made “significant strides” in reducing achievement gaps, according to the university’s news release.
The school has also ramped up its fundraising efforts in recent years. In 2019, the university wrapped up its “IGNITE: The Campaign for UCF” initiative, which brought in $531 million in gifts and commitments over eight years. It was the most ambitious and successful fundraising campaign in UCF’s history, the university said.
Cartwright said Tuesday in the press release he hoped Scott’s gift would encourage others to donate to the university.
“While our resources are finite, we can accelerate and amplify our impact with the help of others. I hope our alumni and friends will join Ms. Scott and Mr. Jewett in helping to provide a foundation for UCF’s future,” Cartwright said. “... Because every new investment creates opportunities for students to be the first in their families to earn a degree, creating generational change for their families and their communities.”
Scott, the ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, is one of the world’s wealthiest women and, since her 2019 divorce from the tech magnate, has rapidly become one of its most-prolific philanthropists. To date, she has given away more than $8 billion, according to the New York Times. That figure includes gifts totaling $4.2 billion to 384 organizations that Scott announced last December, including several historically Black colleges and universities, community colleges and tribal colleges. Scott’s wealth has only grown despite her gift-giving, due in part to the rising value of her Amazon stock. Forbes most recently pegged her net worth at nearly $60 billion. She wrote on her blog that focusing on large donors in stories of social progress “is a distortion of their role.”
As they give away much of their wealth, she and Jewett are “governed by a humbling belief that it would be better if disproportionate wealth were not concentrated in a small number of hands,” and that solutions were best designed and implemented by others, she added.
“Though we still have a lot to learn about how to act on these beliefs without contradicting and subverting them, we can begin by acknowledging that people working to build power from within communities are the agents of change,” Scott wrote on her blog. “Their service supports and empowers people who go on to support and empower others.”