Donor support enhances the Binghamton experience

Binghamton University is enhanced by generous donor support. Just some of the gifts that donors have made in the first three months of 2021 include support for:

• Senior students undertaking energy or environmental capstone design projects. This is continued support from the Avangrid Foundation to reimburse student teams for approved project costs. Capstone project teams typically consist of Thomas J. Watson College of Engineering and Applied Science senior students.
• The Judaic Studies Department to fund opportunities for faculty research, high-impact student learning experiences, Jewish cultural and educational activities on campus, and more. Through the Richard Byrne ’83 Endowment for Judaic Studies, Byrne’s continued support provides essential resources to help the department fulfill a variety of needs.
• The SOM Dean’s Excellence Fund Endowment. With their gift commitment, Mitchell S. Goldstein ’89 and Lenore M. Goldstein ’90 are supporting the School of Management’s initiatives to enhance teaching, learning and research. Such initiatives could include professional development opportunities, the purchase of important analytical tools and other technology, and the recruitment of top students and faculty, to name some examples.
• The establishment of a Health Sciences Interdisciplinary Summer Research Grant to benefit graduate or undergraduate students. With this grant, donor Stuart Horowitz ’79 intends for students from the School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences to work with a faculty member from another discipline, or a faculty member from the Pharmacy School to work with a student from another discipline. Faculty and students from the Pharmacy School, working together, may also collaborate across disciplines.
• The Watson Scholars Program. IBM Endicott is sponsoring this program, which supports undergraduate students in the Thomas J. Watson College of Engineering and Applied Science who are underrepresented minorities, female or economically disadvantaged, and who are strong candidates for graduate education and careers in engineering or computer science.
• The Linda Patia Spear Graduate Student Excellence Fund to enable opportunities for behavioral neuroscience graduate students to participate in international or domestic conferences, scientific workshops and technical training courses, or other professional development activities that will significantly shape the trajectory of their research careers. Norman E. Spear, Binghamton distinguished professor emeritus of psychology, created the fund in memory of his wife, Linda P. Spear, a distinguished professor emerita of psychology at the University who died in October 2020.
• The Al Vos Excellence in Community Engagement Award and the Al Vos Shakespearean Experience Award, both newly established by Binghamton Associate Professor Emeritus of English Al Vos. The awards are designed to incentivize undergraduate students to seek out high-impact learning experiences that extend beyond the classroom, resulting in personal growth and real-world understanding, Vos said.