The Campaign for UC Davis: Philanthropy News

11.19.2012 Templeton Foundation awards grant for meditation research

The John Templeton Foundation has awarded a grant of $2.3 million over three years to continue and extend the Shamatha Project, the most comprehensive investigation yet conducted into the effects of intensive meditation training on mind and body. The Shamatha Project is led by Clifford Saron,…

11.15.2012 Gifts of $2.4 million jump-start work on recital hall

Under the rain of confetti and to the roll of drums, University of California, Davis, officials today celebrated the start of a project to clear a site for a $15 million new music recital hall and classroom building. The milestone was made possible by philanthropic support from local arts…

10.5.2012 Student government raises funds to offer scholarships

Michelle Perez — wife, mother of an autistic child, part-time hospital worker and UC Davis student — breathed a sign of relief: A $1,000 scholarship from the student government came at just the right time to pay for a summer course required for her major. The Sacramento woman is among…

09.25.2012 Annual giving tops $132 million

Donors committed $132.4 million to the University of California, Davis, during the 2011-12 fiscal year, surpassing the previous year’s total of $117.6 million and marking the sixth consecutive year that philanthropic gifts exceeded $100 million. The latest commitments bring the university…

09.13.2012 Fighting childhood obesity in the Central Valley

Curbing obesity among Mexican-heritage children in California’s Central Valley is the focus of a new center set to open its doors Thursday in the Fresno County town of Firebaugh. Called “Niños Sanos, Familia Sana” (Healthy Children, Healthy Family), the center is a…

07.25.2012 New endowed chair blends science and humanities

Educating a generation raised on video games, University of California, Davis, Professor Colin Milburn makes use of students’ literacy in interactive media — coaxing poetry and literature off the pages and into the third dimension. Milburn, an associate professor of English, is newly…

07.9.2012 $1.6 million grant to raise STEM achievement in K-12 schools

The University of California, Davis, School of Education will join forces with K-12 schools in the towns of Davis and Dixon to improve STEM education, thanks to a $1.6 million grant from the S.D. Bechtel Jr. Foundation. The four-year grant will be implemented through a partnership of UC Davis…

06.5.2012 Ortiz named to new Popper opera professorship

Composer Pablo Ortiz has been named the first Jan and Beta Popper Professor in Opera at the University of California, Davis, an honor that will enable him to write more opera and expand public access to singing theater. The endowed professorship is a gift to UC Davis from the estate of…

05.21.2012 UC Davis professor receives $5.6 million for gratitude research

UC Davis psychology professor Robert Emmons practices what he researches, expressing thanks for a $5.6 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation to advance the science of gratitude. “Thanks to the generosity of the John Templeton Foundation, we will be able to rapidly grow the science…

04.5.2012 Teaching prize awarded to soil science professor Randy Dahlgren

The phrase “dull as dirt” does not apply to professor Randy Dahlgren’s soil science classes. Time and again on his student evaluations, the words “enthusiasm,” “passion” and “energy” pop up. In the classroom, his movements are bold, his voice…

01.6.2012 UC Davis reaches $750 million fundraising milestone

The University of California, Davis, announced today that it has raised more than $750 million from more than 85,000 donors — putting the campus three-quarters of the way toward the $1 billion goal set for its first comprehensive fundraising campaign. “I am grateful to the generosity…

12.21.2011 W.M. Keck Foundation awards two million-dollar grants to UC Davis

The W.M. Keck Foundation has awarded $2 million in grants to the University of California, Davis, for research on cell mechanics and the genetics of common diseases. Professor Gang-Yu Liu, Department of Chemistry, and Professor Ian Kennedy, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering,…

The Campaign for UC Davis

Philanthropy news