Corporate Governance Institute Receives Endowed Chair and Shareholder Value Endowment

San Diego State University’s Fowler College of Business announced a $2.25 million gift from Batchelder/Washington Investments LLC to support its first endowed chair and a separate endowment for the university’s Corporate Governance Institute (CGI).

The Ralph V. Whitworth Chair in Corporate Governance, named in honor of leading pioneer in activist investing, Ralph Whitworth, was established by a $1.5 million gift. The gift comes with a dollar-for-dollar match from the Ron and Alexis Fowler Match for a total of $3 million. The Corporate Governance Institute also recieved a $750,000 gift for a Shareholder Value Endowment, with the match to toal $1.5 million.

Ralph Whitworth was a central player in advancing responsible investor activism, from advocating for the key “short slate” SEC rule change in the early 1990s through co-founding and building Relational Investors into a $6 billion investment fund based in San Diego. During his career as an activist investor, Whitworth served on 11 corporate boards, including Mattel, Waste Management, and Tektronix, and as Hewlett-Packard’s interim chairman of the board.