Wealthy Donors

Billionaire philanthropist David Rubenstein is making a second $10 million gift in less than six months to the Kennedy Center in Washington to help reach younger and more economically diverse audiences.

The gift announced Tuesday makes Rubenstein, of Bethesda, Md., the largest single donor in the center's history, with donations totaling $23 million.

Rubenstein became the center's chairman last year and is co-founder of The Carlyle Group, a private equity firm.

Billionaire David H. Koch opened the new David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which he gave $100 million to help build. And in a brief, and rare, interview, Mr. Koch, 70, spoke of his hopes for the new center, his prostate cancer and the prank call heard around the world.

The 2010 Study of High Net-Worth Philanthropy provides fundraisers with insights on wealthy donors' behaviors and giving preferences.

Wealthy donors have begun playing a parallel role in the country’s next-largest educational network: Roman Catholic schools. In New York — as in Boston, Baltimore and Chicago — shrinking enrollment and rising school deficits in recent years have deepened the church’s dependence on its cadres of longtime benefactors. Donors have responded generously, but many who were once content to write checks and attend student pageants are now asking to see school budgets, student reading scores and principals’ job evaluations.

The year 2010 brought a lot of talk of philanthropy by the super-rich—but not much giving. Just 17 people on The Chronicle’s annual list of the 50 most-generous donors also appeared on Forbes magazine’s list of the 400 wealthiest Americans.

Donors and nonprofit officials said fears of the economy sliding back into recession and uncertainty about tax rules combined to shrink big giving. But with the federal estate tax and deduction limits resolved, at least temporarily, and warnings about a double-dip recession having faded, 2011 could be rosier.

Teach For America, the education organization that places recent college graduates in low-income public schools, is getting $100 million to launch its first-ever endowment in hopes of making the grass-roots organization a permanent fixture in education. The program — which is now in communities from Atlanta to rural New Mexico to Los Angeles — announced Thursday that four philanthropists are joining to create a stable, long-term source of money. It's welcome news for an organization that had more than 46,000 applications for just 4,400 teaching slots this academic year.

A huge charity gift by a high-tech tycoon has shone a harsh light on the philanthropic track record of India's established and emerging billionaires. Mr. Azim Premji announced earlier this month that he was giving US$2 billion (S$2.5 billion) to fund rural education.

In India, individuals and companies account for just 10 percent of charity funding, compared with 75 percent in the U.S.

Just in time for Christmas, N.C. State University is getting the biggest gift in its 123-year history. Lonnie C. Poole Jr., who made a fortune in the garbage-hauling business, and his wife, Carol Johnson Poole, are giving the university $40 million. That single gift will swell NCSU's entire endowment by nearly 10 percent and instantly boost the profile of the university's young management college, which is getting most of the money.

Donors to The Salvation Army can double their donated dollars to the charity during this holiday season. The Salvation Army announced Tuesday that three anonymous donors have offered to match all donations up to $300,000 given to the charity's red kettles in the Chicago area through Friday. A fourth anonymous donor has offered to match gold coins found in the kettles up to 100 coins.

For 99.9 percent of the players in the NBA, July 1, 2011 is circled on their calendars as the start of a potential lockout if the player's union and the league's owners can't come to terms on a new collective bargaining agreement before the current one expires on June 30. For Los Angeles Lakers forward Ron Artest, July 1 marks the day he will announce just how much of his 2011-12 salary he will donate to charities to benefit mental health awareness.