David and Suzanne Deal Booth
/SOURCE OF WEALTH: Chairman and CEO of Dimensional Fund Advisors
FUNDING AREAS: Education, Arts & Culture.
OVERVIEW: In 2008, David Booth and family donated $300 million to the University of Chicago, the largest contribution in the university's history, and the business school was renamed in his honor. The couple has interests in education, and arts and culture—Booth's wife, Suzanne, is heavily involved in the arts. The couple formerly conducting their philanthropy through Suzanne Deal Booth and David G. Booth Inc., which gave away around $33,000 in 2015, its final year of operation. The Booths do not appear to have a current foundation through which they move their philanthropy.
BACKGROUND: David G. Booth received both his B.A. and M.S. from the University of Kansas, and received an MBA from University of Chicago in 1971. He cofounded Dimensional Fund Advisors in 1981 with classmate Rex Sinquefield. The Austin-based firm manages some $450 billion in assets.
ISSUES:
EDUCATION: In 2008, the Booths made a record breaking $300 million gift to University of Chicago. In 2012, Booth also gave a $2.5 million gift to his other alma mater, the University of Kansas, toward a new business school. Apart from this work, other higher education philanthropy has involved University of Houston, University of Texas at Austin, Georgetown University, New York University, and Rice University, the latter two being Suzanne’s alma maters. Note that philanthropy at Georgetown has involved renovation of the school's Special Collections Research Center at Lauinger Library.
Other support has involved outfits such as Austin Achieve Public Schools, "an open-enrollment, tuition-free public charter school," Exceptional Children's Foundation, whose mission is to "provide the highest quality services for children and adults who are challenged with developmental, learning, and emotional disabilities," St. Stephen's Episcopal School, mindPOP, which "ensures that each and every child benefits from creative learning," and GENaustin, whose mission is to "support and guide girls to make wise choices as they navigate the unique pressures of girlhood."
ARTS & CULTURE: Suzanne Deal Booth has an art history degree from Rice and a Masters in art history and conservation from NYU. She has worked at such institutions as the Kimbell Art Museum and the Met. She founded Friends of Heritage Preservation, and serves on the boards of LACMA, the Menil Collection, Centre Pompidou Foundation, Ballroom Marfa and The Contemporary Austin. Given her resume, it is no surprise that grantmaking through Suzanne Deal Booth and David G. Booth Inc. has heavily featured arts and culture outfits. Recent support has gone to Chinati Foundation, a contemporary art museum in Marfa, Texas, Dallas Museum of Art, Fusebox, which "champions adventurous works of art across a variety of different mediums," primarily through an annual art festival, Nelson Atkins Museum, New Orleans Museum of Art, Austin Film Festival, Centre Pompidou Foundation, and LACMA, among others.
A component of this philanthropy also involves preservation and conservation, with recent funds going to National Trust for Historic Preservation, Texas State History Museum Foundation, International Network for the Conservation of Contemporary Art, and the World Monuments Fund.
OTHER: Assorted sums have gone to environmental outfits such as Waller Creek Conservancy. A component of the couple's philanthropy also involves the west coast with a steady stream of money recently going to California Community Foundation.
LOOKING FORWARD: Aside from Booth's support of business schools at his alma maters, Suzanne's interests in arts and culture appear to guide much of this couple's philanthropy. This may well continue to hold.
CONTACT:
Suzanne Deal Booth and David G. Booth Inc. does not have much of a web presence or a clear avenue of contact. Below is an address:
Suzanne Deal Booth and David G. Booth Inc.
4107 Lakeplace Ln.
Austin, TX 78746
LINK:
