| Stevens’ ultimatum is the most significant response to the rising tension between elite universities and Wall Street executives.
Plenty of alums have threatened to pause donations over concerns of antisemitism on campus and schools’ responses, or lack thereof. Taking money back is a whole other ball game.
To be sure, Penn isn’t exactly hurting for cash. The school’s endowment totals some $21 billion. Losing $100 million, while an incredible sum, won’t necessarily make a dent.
But the optics of a Penn-grad-turned-finance-exec — the exact type of person Penn presumably pitches incoming students as an ally of the school — forcibly taking money away from it cuts deeper than losing $100 million.
The ties between Penn and Wall Street run deep. In the same way the University of Alabama is a breeding ground for NFL players, Penn is for Wall Streeters.
And it’s not just any Wall Streeters, but pretty successful ones. An analysis by Forbes in 2022 found that UPenn had the most undergraduate alumni on its ranking of the wealthiest Americans with 17 grads, including D1 Capital Partners Daniel Sundheim and Blackstone’s Jon Gray.
But there will be those who don’t like the idea of the uber-wealthy holding so much power over universities, even if they disagree with how the presidents handled the congressional hearing. The reality, though, is that billionaire donors and money managers have long held considerable sway via their relationship with elite universities’ endowments. |
