California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo

Contribution Highlights

• Denver-based Leprino Foods Company, a world leader in innovative dairy food production, has pledged $5 million to remodel Cal Poly's dairy science teaching laboratories and to provide initial start-up costs for a new master's degree program. The first of its kind in the United States, the new Master of Professional Studies in Dairy Foods degree program will be designed to develop the next generation of resourceful and innovative professionals that the dairy industry needs.
• Private donors John and Connie Nielsen founded the Mustang '60 Projects Shop in 2008, a hands-on student project laboratory in the College of Engineering that enables students to bring their projects to life. Realizing that the facility is now a core piece of Cal Poly's Learn by Doing teaching methodology, they decided "one gift was not enough." This year, they provided an endowment to fund a technician position to ensure that the engineering laboratory is well maintained and that an expert is always available to students.
• Waste Connections, Inc. has committed $1 million to establish Cal Poly's Global Waste Research Institute, which represents the first collaborative effort between a public university and industry to promote the development of sustainable waste management technologies. The institute will provide an educational and practicing platform not only for students and faculty, but also for the professional community, regulators and the general public to discover new technologies and sustainable practices for waste management, which is an increasingly complex challenge that Cal Poly wants to help solve.

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