Missouri journalism center receives $30m gift

 JournalismPakistan.com |  Published 13 years ago

COLUMBIA: A University of Missouri journalism think tank has received a $30.1 million endowment — one of the largest gifts in school history — to continue its research into the digital future of news, university leaders announced Thursday.

The donation to the Reynolds Journalism Institute trails only the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation's 2004 contribution of $31 million to create the digital research center.

For an industry that's seen its traditional economic model collapse, the gift was a cause for celebration at the Missouri journalism school, the nation's oldest.

"We believe in journalism," foundation president Steven Anderson said. "It's a changing industry. The journalism institute is in exactly the right place to be out front of innovations and changes in the industry. This is an investment to help shape its future."

The new donation establishes a permanent endowment to cover the institute's ongoing operating expenses and follows a $15 million gift to Reynolds Journalism Institute in 2009 for operating expenses. The Reynolds moniker also graces the MU campus alumni center thanks to a $9.5 million donation from the late media mogul's fortune two decades ago.

That gift has made the Reynolds name a common one on campuses across the country, including the University of Arkansas' football stadium, the journalism school at the University of Nevada in Reno and several performing arts centers at schools in Arkansas and Oklahoma.

Donald Worthington Reynolds was a 1927 graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism whose early newspaper purchases grew into the Donrey Media Group. The company's properties included the Las Vegas Review-Journal in the city where the Reynolds Foundation is now based. Reynolds died in 1993. - AP