UWM fund-raising campaign reaches $125 million

Milwaukee, Wis. - More than a year sooner than anticipated, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee has exceeded its goal of raising $100 million in funds from private sources, attracting a final total of $125 million during the Campaign for UWM.

The figure is an upward revision of the figure announced by Chancellor Carlos E. Santiago at a gathering of community leaders and donors in November.

This campaign goal was 10 times larger than the last one undertaken in the 1980s, according to Santiago. He said the money would be invested to generate financial support for students, programmatic support for our academic activities, and infrastructure support for campus expansion. Specifically, he said the campaign funds would be used for the following:

• $41.5 million is dedicated to support academic departments and faculty.

• $40 million is destined for a campus expansion and special initiatives such as radio station WUWM.

• $29 million has been dedicated to support student scholarships and fellowships.

• More than $14 million is devoted to research infrastructure.

In November of last year, philanthropist Michael J. Cudahy announced that he would provide funds to help UWM acquire land at the Milwaukee County Grounds in Wauwatosa to build a new College of Engineering and Applied Science building. The new satellite campus will be known as the Michael J. Cudahy Innovation Park.

Adding to the university's momentum is the state budget signed into law in October, which included reinvestment in UWM as part of Gov. Jim Doyle's Grow Milwaukee initiative, and a $10 million gift during the campaign from Sheldon Lubar of Lubar & Co., which led to renaming UWM's business school to the Sheldon B. Lubar School of Business.

Santiago thanked those who took part in the campaign, including co-chairs Gale Klappa of We Energies, Dennis Kuester of Marshall & Ilsley Corp., Keith Nosbusch of Rockwell Automation, James Ziemer of Harley-Davidson, Edward Zore of Northwestern Mutual, and Lubar.

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