Giving Back
By ELIZABETH BERNSTEIN
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
April 8, 2005; Page W2
Teachers' Aid
Think public-school fifth-graders need a little more Shakespeare in their lives? Or that second-graders could use a butterfly nursery to learn about life cycles? Log on to DonorsChoose.org , a Web site that posts requests from public-school teachers for classroom supplies and projects that need funding.
The site, created by Charles Best, a 29-year-old former high-school teacher in New York, lists the costs and details provided by teachers. There are about 2,500 proposals on the site, at various prices. (The Shakespeare program asks for $5,796; the butterfly project runs $133).
Donors can click on the projects they want to sponsor and pay online, or they send a check directly to the New York-based charity, which will buy the needed supplies or pass funds along. Donors get a tax deduction -- and thank-you notes and photos of the projects from the kids.
Jon Beyman, a managing director at Lehman Brothers, says he logs on to the site when he's trying to let off steam. "I need something to remind me why I work so hard," says Mr. Beyman, who's spent about $40,000 on 63 proposals.
Artistic Direction
The Estate of the late Henry Wolf, the former art director of Esquire and Harper's Bazaar magazines, has given his Westchester County, N.Y., country home to Manhattan's New School University, a gift estimated at $2.5 million.
The 12-acre estate in North Salem, N.Y, includes a five-bedroom house built in 1790, a caretaker's cottage and a barn. The New School says it hasn't decided what to do with the property.
If it sells the estate, the university plans to use the proceeds to fund scholarships to its Parsons School of Design.
Mr. Wolf, who died in February at the age of 79, influenced magazine design after becoming art director of Esquire in the early 1950s. He taught at Parsons for 30 years, and was on the board of governors for four years. Mr. Wolf also left $1 million to endow a chair at Parsons.
Contact me at givingback@wsj.com
Gift of the Week
Eye Spy
WHO GAVE IT: Tom Clancy, best-selling author, and his wife, Alexandra.
HOW MUCH: $2 million.
WHO GOT IT: The Johns Hopkins University Wilmer Eye Institute, in Baltimore.
BY REQUEST: The gift will endow a professorship in ophthalmology. Dr. Terrence P. O'Brien, who performed eye surgery on Mr. Clancy several years ago, will be the first to hold the position.
YOUR NAME HERE: Mr. Clancy reluctantly agreed to the university's suggestion that the post be called the Tom Clancy Professor of Ophthalmology.
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