Nike co-founder Phil Knight and his wife, Penny, are making one of the biggest donations in the history of American higher education, pledging $1 billion to the University of Oregon.
The contribution will be used to establish a new engineering college at the university, significantly expanding its current engineering education. The school currently offers graduate-level bioengineering programs, but the new college will introduce a broader undergraduate engineering program.
University officials expect the project to take roughly 10 years to fully develop. The long-term plan is designed to increase the number of engineers being trained in the region while helping the university attract more students at a time when colleges across the country are facing changing demographics.
The new college is also expected to strengthen the University of Oregon’s position in science, technology and engineering education. By creating more opportunities for students to study engineering at the undergraduate level, the university hopes to help address a shortage of engineers in the region.
The donation is particularly significant because of Knight’s long connection to the university. Before becoming one of the world’s most recognizable business figures, Knight attended the University of Oregon and competed there as a track athlete.
Knight later co-founded Nike with his former track coach, Bill Bowerman, in 1964. Their partnership eventually transformed Nike into one of the world’s largest sportswear companies.
The Knight family has already provided major financial support to the university over the years. Their latest $1 billion commitment brings their lifetime giving to the University of Oregon to more than $2 billion.
Much of that funding has gone toward major projects across the campus, including scientific research and athletic facilities. One of the most notable projects is the Knight Campus for Accelerating Scientific Impact, which focuses on turning scientific discoveries into practical technologies and solutions.
The new engineering college represents another major expansion of that long-term investment in the university. Rather than funding a single building or short-term program, the latest contribution is intended to support the creation and development of an entire college.
The University of Oregon will now begin working through the decade-long process required to design, build and launch the new institution. That process is expected to involve new facilities, academic programs, faculty recruitment and the development of undergraduate engineering courses.
Once completed, the college will give students at the University of Oregon access to a much broader range of engineering education and could play a role in supplying more engineers to the region.
For the university, the donation marks a major step in expanding its academic footprint. For the Knight family, it continues a decades-long relationship with the institution where Phil Knight first developed the athletic background and connections that eventually helped shape his path to Nike.
