Hampshire College Receives Largest Single Donation Since Founding
Hampshire College is announcing a $5,000,000 investment in its Change in the Making campaign by Paula H. and James S. Crown 71F. Mr. and Mrs. Crown will match donations from fellow alums through a Founders Challenge that aims to raise significant support from the College’s first five entering classes of 1970–1975 in honor of Hampshire’s 50th Anniversary year. Change in the Making: A Campaign for Hampshire has raised $19,456,747 of its $60 million goal since launching in January 2019.
“Since its founding, Hampshire College has challenged passionate students to create their own paths, gather the resources they need to solve problems, and take risks,” said Mr. and Mrs. Crown. “The distinct education Hampshire College offers is an essential part of today’s higher education landscape.”
Hampshire College welcomed its 50th Anniversary class in the fall of 2020. This $5,000,000 gift is the ninth multi-million dollar donation Hampshire has received and the largest single gift since the College’s founding.
“I am deeply grateful to Jim and Paula for their generosity and their confidence. This is a game-changing gift for Hampshire at this pivotal time in our history,” said President Ed Wingenbach, who joined Hampshire in 2019 and is leading the College’s transformation to an adaptive, unbounded curriculum that empowers students to pursue pressing global issues from their first year onward. “We’re re-inventing the liberal arts college for today’s students, who in the face of a global pandemic are more focused than ever on how to make an impact from the moment they leave high school.”
Mr. and Mrs. Crown join Campaign Co-Chairs Ken Burns 71F, Lucy McFadden 70F, Julie Schecter 71F, and Gail O’Neill Caulkins 73F in the ranks of founding alums who have made pace-setting campaign gifts. Change in the Making: A Campaign for Hampshire will raise $60 million by 2024 to fuel Hampshire’s curricular transformation, enact its plan for financial sustainability, and maintain its leadership as a distinctive and experimenting institution.
“I’m honored and grateful to have Jim and Paula’s partnership as we launch Hampshire’s next fifty years,” said Campaign Co-Chair Ken Burns 71F. “Jim and I share the knowledge of how this education transforms you, and how it can help you transform the world. Thanks to Jim and Paula, I know our founding classmates will be inspired to dig as deep as we have with their campaign support.”
“The half-century mark is a significant one for any college, and even more so for Hampshire, whose distinct mission is more and more rare in American higher education,” said Trustee Advancement Chair and Campaign Co-Chair Lucy McFadden 70F. “Jim and I were fortunate to be part of Hampshire’s founding, and along with our classmates, I believe we can create a future for Hampshire that is even more powerful and influential than its past.”
The distinct education Hampshire College offers is an essential part of today’s higher education landscape
Jim and Paula Crown
About James and Paula Crown
James S. Crown is chairman and chief executive officer of Henry Crown and Company, chairman of The Aspen Institute, and trustee of the Museum of Science and Industry and the University of Chicago. He serves as lead director of General Dynamics Corporation and is a director of JPMorgan Chase. Crown is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a former member of the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board appointed by President Barack Obama. He earned a B.A. in political science in 1976 from Hampshire College and received his law degree from Stanford Law School.
Paula H. Crown is a multimedia artist who incorporates cutting-edge technology, social activism, collaboration, and a commitment to sustainability in her studio practice. Crown earned her B.A. from Duke University and her M.F.A. in painting and drawing in 2012 from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has had solo exhibitions at the Aspen Institute (2013), Dallas Contemporary (2014), Marlborough Gallery, New York (2015), The Goss-Michael Foundation, Dallas (2016), 10 Hanover, London (2017), Studio Cannaregio, Venice (2018) concurrent with the 16th Venice Architectural Biennale, and Fort Gansevoort, New York (2018). She has participated in several group exhibitions nationally and her works are in numerous public and top-100 private collections. In 2009, President Barack Obama appointed Crown to the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities. She is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Museum of Modern Art in New York and serves on the Aspen Institute Committee of the Arts.