SU receives $75 million gift for Newhouse School

The Samuel I. Newhouse Foundation pledged $75 million to the Newhouse School marking the largest donation in Syracuse University’s 150-year history.

Donald Newhouse, a member of SU’s class of 1951 and whose father’s name graces the communications school, announced the gift on the first day of spring classes in the Hergenhan Auditorium.

Newhouse lauded former Newhouse deans David Rubin and the late Lorraine Branham for their commitment to the school, stating in a press release that their “unwavering support” helped to realize his father’s dream of creating “the finest journalism school in the world.”

Chancellor Kent Syverud said the gift intended to help support people and school programs will ensure future students to have opportunities to learn and thrive while at SU.

“The proud legacy of the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications is more important now than it has ever been,” said Syverud in a press release. “The generosity of the Newhouse family enables Syracuse University to educate journalists whose dedication to the First Amendment enriches our society.”

The $75 million will be allocated once a permanent dean has been selected. The press release stated it will fund “multiple academic initiatives”. The search for a new dean is ongoing, and SU aims to have the position filled by July, which marks the beginning of a new fiscal year.

Newhouse, son of Samuel I. Newhouse who founded Advance Publications, expressed his confidence in the SU’s ability to select an “outstanding successor” to Branham, who passed away last spring after battling cancer.

Donald Newhouse is an honorary trustee; however, His son Michael holds a voting position on the Board of Trustees. Samuel I. Newhouse’s original gift of $15 million in 1962 was also the largest donation to SU at the time.

“In this era in which public communications is undergoing continual and radical change,” Newhouse said in the press release, “my family and I expect to continue our long-term commitment to ensure that the school my Dad helped found almost 60 years ago remains the leading communications school in the world for another generation.”