https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2016/10/18/nike-co-founder-gives-u-oregon-500-million
For sciences.
Nice to see him spend his money on something besides celebrity endorsements. Great news for the people of Oregon.
Maybe that’s why Knight is a billionaire and you are not.
it is also good to see him help grow and strengthen STEM and business program/s at a non elitist school like those in the ivy league … who do not need anymore money. (I get it is persons’s money to donate as they see fit but every time somebody gives more money to the elitists at Harvard I say why?)
@TooOld4School @barrons the problem with Knight’s past contributions is the focus on Oregon football to the exclusion of all other programs, both athletic and academic. This latest gift is part of an effort to lift Oregon’s competitiveness for top high school graduates, especially nationally given that the state ranks in the bottom 3 of 50 states for high school graduation rates.
"at a non elitist school like those in the ivy league " Why the hating, @zobroward?
surely calling out the ivy league for what it is…is not a bad thing? so many high school students caught up in the rat race of trying to get validation by getting into a name brand school would be better served with less stress by simply bypassing applications to those schools all together(and stanford /u of chicago and a couple others too)
really there are thousands of schools in the united states that would give just as good an education minus the designer name but for a core group of hyper competitive students(or their parents) the need for this unnecessary validation causes so much angst and stress and for the many who get rejected depression and feeling of lack of self worth. I am not a fan of the ivy/elitist schools or the culture they breed…but surely those schools, current students,faculty and alumni will be just fine without me giving them a thumbs and telling them how awesome they are.
so back to the original subject mr knight gets two thumbs up from me!
In the past Knight gave large amounts to the now Knight Library and the Oregon Law School and others in addition to sports.
http://www.oregonlive.com/playbooks-profits/index.ssf/2014/08/phil_and_penny_knight_thanks_t.html
I think @zobroward makes a valid point. The utility of new money to an Oregon or most others far exceeds what a few extra million does for H or similar where it gets lost in the billions.
Why is that a “problem”? (Its his hard earned money to do with as he sees fit, IMO.)
What does a low HS grad rate (which I never would have guessed the Oregon is #49-- only DC is worst) have to do with a ‘competitive’ Uni?
@bluebayou a state university that draws overwhelmingly from in state resident students faces a smaller pool of prospectives when those in state resident students do not graduate high school. Oregon isn’t a large population state to begin with and the graduation rate shrinks the application size even more. Simple numbers.
“This latest gift is part of an effort to lift Oregon’s competitiveness for top high school graduates, especially nationally.”
Definitely. UO is just 51% in-state students. Building a national brand (in part through eye-catching football uniforms) is pretty key to its existence and success. So is having strong academic programs that will attract smart kids to attend.
sorry, I misread earlier. Back to SBUX.
It’s nice of him to be such a generous supporter of academics, though I will never forgive him for maneuvering to shutter their wrestling program in order to start a baseball team when Nike wanted to get into baseball equipment.
I know it is only a sample of two, but both high-stats kids we know from our area who went there to be part of the honors college hated it. It is nearly $60k/year OOS, and with CA and WA kids with better options, hard to recruit top west coast students.
There is a girl there, a friend of D’s, who likes it but she is an academic and social fit.
I applaud his efforts at funding STEM at U of O. The university attracts not only in state applicants but a number of California applicants as well.
Perhaps they offer scholarship money to recruit such students? But also, they may be recruiting good but not top-end students from CA and WA who may find the idea of going to a flagship university more appealing than a non-flagship university in their own state where the flagship universities are too selective for them, and have sufficient parental money or are offered sufficient scholarship money (similar to AZ).
Probably just the S and M. UO does not offer the T (engineering technology) or E (engineering) majors.
@ucbalumnus , true, perhaps the students from WA and CA are not the top students from their respective states. However, I know of top students from OR attending U of O because it was more affordable than some other options. I’m happy money is being funneled into academia. The football program has benefited for years.
Nice to see. I know Oregon has a fantastic running program and is closely associated with Nike. Good to see investment in public schools.
The Big O may offer merit to some kids ucb, but their FA website does not promise much and they have the reputation of not offering much merit to the Seattle area. Oregon State, at least for the kids we know, offered more. I know for my kids UW was just too close to home, and is probably a factor for other kids who choose to head down to Eugene.