Dive Brief:
- The University of Maryland has received a $31 million donation — its largest ever — from the founder of Oculus, the virtual reality headset maker acquired by Facebook for $2 billion. The donation will fund a new computer science center at the school.
- In spite of the economic downturn, several universities in Maryland, the District of Columbia, and Virginia have had record donations within the last five years, the Washington Post reports.
- Examples of other record donations include $80 million to George Washington University in March, from Michael Milken and Sumner Redstone, for public health scholarships; and $100 million to Georgetown University in 2013 from Frank McCourt Jr., former owner of the Dodgers baseball team, to create a public policy school.
Dive Insight:
Iribe's donation to UMD will also be used for a $1 million computer science scholarship fund. The new computer science center will include labs for virtual reality, augmented reality, robotics, computer vision, and artificial intelligence. Iribe dropped out of the university in his freshman year in the late 1990s, but said he was inspired by the experience and made lifelong friends. Mark Zuckerberg also inspired him, not only by paying $2 billion for Oculus, but also through his own philanthropy and pledge to give away most of his money, TechCrunch reports.