Duke trustee gives $5.75M to new public policy school

Rubenstein’s gift will provide a $3.5 million endowment to support the school’s Program in Environmental and Energy Policy, $1.125 million to fund a distinguished speakers series and $1.125 million to provide internship support for public policy master’s degree students.

“David Rubenstein has been the greatest single supporter of the Sanford School, and it’s right that he should be the one to put us across the goal line,” Brodhead said in a statement. “I am deeply grateful for his wisdom as a trustee and his leadership in this historic development. Duke’s newest school will be a source of trained intelligence on the major issues facing this country and the world.”

The former Sanford Institute of Public Policy was ranked 10th among the nation’s schools of public policy in the most recent U.S. News and World Report graduate school rankings. In addition, in the past two years, its faculty ranked first one year and second the other in research productivity among all U.S. public policy faculties, according to analyses published in the Chronicle of Higher Education.

“I have always had the greatest admiration for its faculty and students and look forward to seeing the Sanford School broaden its impact, on campus and in the world,” Rubenstein said in a statement. “I am proud to join the many other donors who have made it possible for the Sanford School to establish a global reputation for excellence in a very short time.”

A Baltimore native, Rubenstein is co-founder and managing director of The Carlyle Group, one of the world’s largest private equity firms. He graduated from Duke in 1970, serves as a Duke trustee and is an emeritus member of Sanford’s Board of Visitors. The school’s Rubenstein Hall, which opened in 2005, was named in recognition of his $5 million gift to the project.