Schwarzman grew up in Abington, went to Yale, and is a co-founder and CEO of the Blackstone Group, a huge (and hugely influential) private equity firm. While not quite in the Buffet-Gates-Zuckerberg league, he can look those people in the eye with net worth that has three commas and 11 digits to the left of the decimal point.
$25 million is kind of chump change for him. He gave $150 million to Yale, and they only renamed one building after him. I think this got sold pretty cheap.
Abington is not Philadelphia, but it’s not Lower Merion or Cheltenham, either. As suburban school districts go, it’s not particularly wealthy.
I think that some people believe that putting their names on buildings and schools immortalizes them. It makes their name last long after they’re dead. They’re probably right. People wouldn’t think of Andrew Carnegie much anymore if his name wasn’t all over the buildings that he built and donated.
The donor has the right to name his conditions for the donation. I donate meager amounts of money anonymously, but that’s me. And nobody is going to be putting my name on a building. If the school isn’t willing to meet the conditions, they should either turn it down or attempt to counter with something else. To me, just adding the name doesn’t sound like a big deal, but if they don’t want the 25 million and think it’s not worth it, the turn it down.
@JHS I have to disagree on one point. Abington is not Lower Merion (where Kobe Bryant donated $ and has the gym named after him) but it is bigger than cheltenham and I’d argue has a higher median income. (Rydal, Huntingdon Valley, Jenkintown are all pretty high income areas). At the very least it’s on par with Cheltenham.
I am guessing that it is already known as ASHS because that stands for Abingdon SENIOR HS, but I might be wrong.
While I understand that there is upset over the alleged lack of transparency, $25M is a nice sum of money and invested wisely (at least a portion of it) can earn money over the years that can bring much ROI. Maybe the school board could have negotiated for more and maybe the donor would have pulled it all back, who knows, but I don’t know of too many school districts wealthy enough to turn that down. I think it smacks of arrogance and narcissism to want something named after yourself, but if that’s the price to get kids needed educational opportunities, then so be it. At least he hasn’t spent it on a Lear jet.
Like @twoinanddone, my law school was renamed for a large donor. I only wish my school had been renamed for Thurgood Marshall or someone as worthy, rather than someone able to buy a school’s name. Let’s just say that I refuse to acknowledge the change and only use the name the school had when I graduated.
However, in the case at hand, I think that $25M to be used to educate children is worth perhaps having to hold your nose when you say the name of the school.
@surfcity - Jenkintown is a real place? I LOVE the show “The Goldbergs,” but kind of assumed that they would not use the name of their actual hometown.
To be clear, the school WAS named for Thurgood Marshall and was changed to some donor’s name. I have no idea who the new person is or was, or what he meant to the school other than coughing up the cash. I do not know when or why it was named for Marshall since he didn’t attend, nor would they have accepted a black guy if he had applied the the 40’s/50’s. Of course they wouldn’t have accepted me either since I wasn’t a white male.
In the town I grew up in, the elementary schools were named after dead presidents, the junior high after Ben Franklin, and the high school was named after a mayor or something. When that building became a second junior high, the new high school was just named for the town and the old building/new j.h. retained the name. No one cared. If someone wanted to donate $25 million, we’d have named it after him. No one is that attached to Ben or the dead presidents. Where I live now, most of the schools are named after either a direction (North, South, East high schools) or something in the area (Cottonwood Creek, Highline Trail). Again, bring on the $25 Million.
I think it is somewhat unbecoming on his part unless there is a relevant backstory–say, a parent was forced to drop out of said school during the Depression–but they should take the money.
There are examples of donors who refused to put their name on anything–the Durants, who founded Wellesley, were among them, and so their is a building called “Founders Hall” but no Durant; Elizabeth Noyce, who was a great benefactor in Maine a few decades ago funded a number of institutions on the condition that the name not reflect hers, but the city and state–but I doubt any of us begrudbe Andrew Carnegie his libraries. On the other hand, he was setting an example for others of his era.
I have lived in Abington for 56 years, attended Abington’s public schools as did my children. This whole matter was handled in a way that is typical for the school board and administration. Back room deals, prioritization of public acclaim and publicity over really serving students. When my daughter was in the high school, not that many years ago, the current administration decided to pull the “brightest and best” students out of classes for a solid week of preparation for the PSATs, while the students who needed assistance the most were relegated to two periods per week. The reason - to maximize the chances of having a large number of students named Merit Scholars based on the PSAT results. But no one paid much attention because the administration did a great job of diverting everyone’s attention to the new stadium, also paid for by the same person who got naming rights there. The citizens of Abington will never know the conditions that were placed on the gift that will enable a single individual, with a well known political agenda, to influence the shape of education in Abington for years to come. This was a sell out to the highest bidder.
Someone above made the point that they felt the donor was a terrible person. It’s one thing to see a college named “Terrible Person U”. You just don’t go there. A public HS, kids have little choice.
I think you could go there for a right price. IMO $25M is too cheap. Maybe the board if they are smart could use the public uproar and renegotiate and up the price. @MichaelNKat, if they are so bad what’s stopping residents from getting rid of them?
@Iglooo , several things. No effective political machine to do so, parents who are either bedazzled by superficial trappings and the district’s publicity machine or are afraid of making waves and having a spotlight on themselves because their kids are in the schools, and a segment of the population that equates change with higher taxes.
I think most of the uproar is over the way it was handled. There was no notice to the public, so no real ability to have public comment at a school board meeting. I think the current superintendent is very controversial and I am surprised she has lasted this long. The superintendent in the district where I live now is very open and involved in the community and there is a real partnership between the admin, the board, and the community. It does not sound like this is the case in Abington today.
I like the idea that Schwarzman is trying to spur other wealthy people to give back to public education. It’s a little sad that our society needs to do this - that it is not given enough priority in and of itself. I would love to have more private donations to education. I am not a huge fan of gifts with strings attached, because I trust the administration of my school district to know what the best use of the funds is. And I would really cringe if someone tried to name a building the “surfcity science building” for example. But that’s just me.
Lots of public universities have business, law, medical, and/or engineering divisions named after major donors. Some of them seem to have higher prestige than their host schools.
They would think of him for two minutes, and he would fade into memory. After giving away 90% of his fortune, with 3,000 public libraries, money donated to schools and museums, with so many buildings bearing his name—he will never be forgotten.
The Goldbergs is one of those shows that the entire family can actually watch. My trivia - one of my HS English teachers used to brag about being friends with George Segal, who was at the height of his fame at the time. I never found out if it was actually true, but George Segal is from my area. My kids joke that they are glad they are older or I would try Beverly’s tricks on them.
Back on topic - maybe the guy is truly a horrid person but if he is willing to give $25M to help children, let him assuage his guilt. I would guess that he would also get some kind of tax write-off but I don’t know how that will work out with the new tax laws.
On the other hand, he was setting an example for others of his era.