Cornell University: Nolan Gift and Challenge Funds Boost Scholarships for SC Johnson College Students
More than $66 million in scholarship funds, first announced last fall, are opening up possibilities for students across the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business, thanks to the generosity of alumni.
When Peter Nolan ’80, MBA ’82, and Stephanie Nolan ’84 made their $50 million gift that named the Cornell Peter and Stephanie Nolan School of Hotel Administration, it was matched, one-to-three, by challenge funds from H. Fisk Johnson ’79, MEng ’80, MS ’82, MBA ’84, PhD ’86, and the SC Johnson company as part of their gift to name the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business in 2017. The resulting more than $66 million in philanthropy provides scholarship funding to Nolan Hotel School students, as well as to students across the SC Johnson College through enhancements to scholarships the Nolans established with previous gifts: the Peter and Stephanie Nolan Veterans Professional Scholarship Fund in the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management and the Nolan Family Scholarship Fund in the Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management. The additional funding brings the Nolan Veterans Scholarship Fund to more than $14 million, and the Nolan Family Scholarship Fund to more than $9 million.
“We are deeply grateful for the Nolans’ philanthropy in making scholarships a priority across our college,” says Andrew Karolyi, Charles Field Knight Dean of the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business. “Scholarship support is fundamental to living up to Cornell’s ‘… any person … any study …’ ethos. They have the power to change the trajectory of students’ careers and lives and they uphold Cornell’s commitment to need-blind admission and socioeconomic diversity. I am just delighted to see funds from the matching gift so generously donated by Fisk Johnson and SC Johnson directed to our students.
“The importance of scholarship support to students from less affluent backgrounds is clear: Rather than being debt-constrained in their career choices, they can focus more on immediate impact and less on immediate payback post-graduation,” adds Karolyi. “As business leaders capable of envisioning and realizing a better world, graduates from across our college have more flexibility to choose a path that enables them to make the most difference.”