University of Florida alum, trustee, and namesake of their Warrington College of Business Administration Al Warrington has announced that he is continuing his philanthropic relationship to his alma mater by committing a deferred gift of $16 million to establish an endowment that will privately fund faculty positions in the college.
The faculty positions funded by the new endowment, which will be called the Warrington Faculty Fellows Endowment, will be in the accounting and entrepreneurship fields along with others that will be determined at a later time. Income generated by the endowment will also cover the full salary and benefits for the positions.
"We have an incredible faculty at the college, as evidenced by some major publications that evaluate our team to be the finest business faculty in the nation among public or private institutions, which is the good news," said Warrington. "The bad news, though, is we haven’t added enough professors, as evidenced by a very high student/teacher ratio."
"This gift, which is being accompanied by others, will help address this issue. I hope this gift will encourage others to join in supporting this singularly most important need at our college of business," he added.
Warrington graduated from UF in 1958, earning a bachelor’s degree in business administration. After working at Arthur Andersen & Co. for 32 years, he resigned and became the founding chairman and co-CEO of Sanifill, Inc. and a founder and vice president of House of Cheatham, an Atlanta-based health and beauty aids manufacturer.
He has also since become a founding member in a group that acquired an oilfield service company in Houston, and also was a member of a group that acquired Gulf Coast Mechanical, a company that coats air conditioning and generator coils.
With the donation, Warrington College of Business Administration is now over the $100 million mark as part of the university’s $1.5 billion "Florida Tomorrow" campaign. The funds also are eligible to be matched by Florida’s Trust Fund for Major Gifts, which could potentially bring the total amount of the endowment to $32 million.