Scott and Elena Shleifer give $20 million to University of Pennsylvania for financial aid

Scott Shleifer, a 1999 Wharton graduate, and his wife Elena Shleifer just handed a $20 million check to the University of Pennsylvania to overhaul undergraduate financial aid. The huge donation lands just four years after the couple poured $18 million into the Ivy League school in Philadelphia. Scott Shleifer co-founded Tiger Global Management’s private equity investing arm in 2003 and built a massive fortune through tech bets before stepping back to a senior advisor role. Now that money is funneling directly into campus programs to help middle-class families handle rising tuition bills. The funds break down into 3 specific buckets to reshape how students pay for school. A $12 million chunk creates the Shleifer Scholars Program to give permanent tuition-free scholarships to middle-income undergraduates. That same bucket pays for out-of-class extras like faculty-mentored research, internships, and global experiences. Another $3 million sets up a matching challenge to pull in six new donors who will each give $500,000. The remaining $5 million goes straight to the President’s Priorities Fund to give school leaders fast cash for strategic projects. For families staring down college tuition payments, the push means more grant money is opening up without taking on massive student loans. You do not have to write a billionaire's check to benefit from schools expanding their scholarship endowments. Sometimes a billionaire's gift is the only thing standing between a tuition hike and your kid's class schedule.