In the spirit of American philanthropy, a local doctor has made history by donating $5.7 million dollars of his fortune to Bakersfield College, the largest donation to a community college in California state history.
The news regarding Norman Levan’s donation came out Sept. 13 during a press conference in the foyer of the admissions building.
The money will be used for a diverse set of endowments. These include scholarships for students showing strengths in the humanities and interest in science or medicine; an original essay contest which will award $1,000 to the winner; the establishment of the Norman Levan Center for the Humanities and Medicine at Bakersfield College; and a senior learning endowment to encourage lifelong participation in education.
The Norman Levan Center will be a building that will host seminars on ethics and for faculty, as well as host a visiting scholars program.
This is not the first donation from the doctor. He has made a similar donation of $5 million to St. John’s College in New Mexico, where he earned his graduate degree.
Levan said his decision to donate to Bakersfield College was based primarily on conversations with his close personal friend and former BC President John Collins.
The logistics of the donation had been in the works since the end of the fall semester. Current BC President William Andrews expressed his feelings toward the process by commenting, “Dr. Levan, you made the last five months of my life the most memorable of my career.”
Levan is a dermatologist who was raised in Ohio and Michigan and came out west in the 1930s to go to college at the University of Southern California. After almost accidentally ending up in medical school by scoring incredibly high on a placement test, he entered an internship at the county hospital.
Levan also spent time in the military during World War II and was present for the battle of Okinawa. After completing his education in New Mexico and getting married, he later returned to USC and became the first professor of dermatology.
In a press release, it is revealed that he decided to move to Bakersfield after a cloudy visit one day.
Staying at the Bakersfield Inn, he encountered a group of local doctors by the pool.
“They made it very inviting to come up here,” the press release quotes. His final move came in 1980.
In a private question and answer session that followed the announcement, he modestly confessed to a group of reporters the source of his wealth as coming from 8% of his salary going into TIAA every month and the market’s natural boom, rather than his own financial insight.
The TIAA (Teachers Endowment Retirement Fund) is one of the largest financial services companies in the country. It was originally established by famous American entrepreneur and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie to provide retirement income for retired professors, Finally, Dr. Levan summed up his decision to donate with a bit of advice from Carnegie himself: “The man who dies rich dies in disgrace.”