Ken Griffin Gives Carnegie Mellon $3 Billion, the Largest Gift in Higher Education History
The Citadel founder's donation funds a new CMU Miami campus and a major boost for the Pittsburgh school. The computer science school will carry his name.
Carnegie Mellon University announced Wednesday that Citadel founder and CEO Ken Griffin is giving the school $3 billion, the largest individual gift to a higher education institution in history.
The money is split between the university's home campus in Pittsburgh and a new satellite campus in Miami. Carnegie Mellon said $2 billion will launch CMU Miami, while $1 billion goes to the Pittsburgh campus. Of the Pittsburgh portion, $500 million will be divided evenly between flexible university priorities and the School of Computer Science, which will be renamed the Kenneth C. Griffin School of Computer Science.
CMU Miami is planned for more than 35 acres in the city's Wynwood neighborhood. The university says it will enroll more than 3,500 undergraduate, master's and PhD students and employ nearly 300 faculty and more than 600 staff. Construction begins in 2027, and the first students are expected to enroll in 2028.
The school's leaders say the Miami campus will be organized differently from a traditional university. Instead of building around academic majors and departments, it will center on societal challenges, with initial focus areas in human health, national security, energy and climate, and advanced manufacturing.
"Together, we have an opportunity to extend the very qualities that have long distinguished Carnegie Mellon — our agility, creativity, interdisciplinary culture and relentless focus on impact — to build a new model for higher education that meets the urgency of this moment," said CMU President Farnam Jahanian.
Griffin, who is also joining the university's Board of Trustees, framed the project as a chance to build something from scratch. "CMU Miami represents a generational opportunity to build a new center of research and intellectual life — one that will attract exceptional students, scholars, and researchers from across the globe and rank among the world's most important academic institutions," he said.
Carnegie Mellon has long been known for its computer science program, and naming that school for Griffin ties the founder of one of the world's largest hedge fund and market-making firms to the discipline that has defined the university's reputation.
The announcement did not detail how the $3 billion would be paid out over time or how the Miami campus would be governed day to day. Those questions, along with the accreditation and hiring steps needed to open a campus of that size by 2028, will shape how quickly the new model can be tested.
The announcement was made on September 30, 2026, and Carnegie Mellon described the plan as a new model for higher education.
