The press release announced that MIT Professor of Political Science Willard R. Johnson and Phil Katz, class of 1982, gave Dean of the Graduate School Frank Perkins a check for approximately $2500, which had been collected by the MIT Endowment for Divestiture to prod MIT to oppose apartheid by divesting its holdings in businesses that operated in South Africa during the apartheid period. Following "the victory that had been achieved" in South Africa, the Endowment Trustees voted to release these funds to MIT to be used to boost minority scholarship assistance and advance equal opportunity for victims of racial oppression, especially from South Africa. Other Trustees of the MIT Endowment for...
The press release announced that MIT Professor of Political Science Willard R. Johnson and Phil Katz, class of 1982, gave Dean of the Graduate School Frank Perkins a check for approximately $2500, which had been collected by the MIT Endowment for Divestiture to prod MIT to oppose apartheid by divesting its holdings in businesses that operated in South Africa during the apartheid period. Following "the victory that had been achieved" in South Africa, the Endowment Trustees voted to release these funds to MIT to be used to boost minority scholarship assistance and advance equal opportunity for victims of racial oppression, especially from South Africa. Other Trustees of the MIT Endowment for Divestiture included Mel King, Joseph Weizenbaum, Gretchen Kalonji, John Parsons, Howard Wolpe, Bruce Morrison, and Marc Miller. Johnson and Katz told the MIT Board of Trustees they regretted MIT's refusal to significantly divest but acknowledged MIT's support for disadvantaged South African students, with assistance of the Lotus Corporation's Educational Development Trust Fund and South African MIT Alumnus Neil Frazer.
