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Where do people value learning about different views and values? At UCLA.
One of a university’s most important missions is to bring people — from different cultures, diverse communities, and disparate disciplines — to work together toward greater understanding and the common good. Several campaign gifts demonstrate that donors are committed to that mission, too, and that they consider UCLA the ideal partner to advance it.
Preserving History
UCLA has acquired the Sephardic Temple Tifereth Israel archive, which chronicles the migration of Sephardic Jews from the Mediterranean, Middle East, and North Africa to Los Angeles and their contributions to the city’s culture. Many of the photographs, papers, audiovisual materials, and rare books are written in the endangered language of Ladino, which was spoken by early 20th-century immigrants from Eastern Europe and Western Asia and is kept alive by their descendants today. A lead gift from the Kahn Foundation with additional support from the UCLA Alan D. Leve Center for Jewish Studies Community Advisory Board and the Maurice Amado Foundation enabled the acquisition, which will inform UCLA graduate students, local community members, and online researchers around the world.
Expanding Experience
At the same time, UCLA International Institute is strengthening links to Indonesia, a vital nation and one of the world’s largest democracies. A generous gift from Julia and Ken Gouw will support undergraduate scholarships — a campaign priority — for students to study abroad in addition to Indonesian studies programming within the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at UCLA. Including their previous gift and a grant from the UCLA Chancellor’s Centennial Scholars Match Program, the Gouws’ total contribution to Indonesian Studies at UCLA now stands at $500,000, a testament to how much they — like UCLA — value cross-cultural understanding.
The public university in a city that opens its arms to diversity, UCLA and its philanthropic partners open minds through their multiplicity of passions.
Published June 2017
Community key from Sephardic archive
Leather pouch from Sephardic archive
Colorful certificate from Sephardic archive
