External links
- The Bernard Osher Foundation
- OLLI National Resource Center
- List of Osher Lifelong Learning Institutes
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Osher Lifelong Learning Institutes (OLLI) offer noncredit courses with no assignments or grades to adults over age 50. Since 2001, philanthropist Bernard Osher has made grants from the Bernard Osher Foundation to launch OLLI programs at 120 universities and colleges throughout the United States. [1]
Bernard Osher, a native of Maine, managed the family hardware and plumbing supply business before heading to New York to work for Oppenheimer & Company. He moved to California and became a founding director of World Savings and a founder of its parent company Golden West Financial. He bought the San Francisco auction house Butterfield & Butterfield in 1970 and sold it in 1999 to eBay. World Savings merged with Wachovia Corporation in 2006, which was in turn acquired by Wells Fargo in 2008. In 1977 he established the Bernard Osher Foundation, headquartered in San Francisco, which contributes to higher education, the arts, and social services, with education receiving nearly 80 percent of its grants. [2]
Osher was impressed by the Fromm Institute for Lifelong Learning at the University of San Francisco, and approached the Senior Program at the University of Southern Maine (USM) with his interest in supporting noncredit programs for older adults. He awarded USM an endowment grant in 2001 to expand its program, which was renamed as the first Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. [3] Ed Stolman, a friend of Osher’s who had retired to Sonoma County, California, approached Sonoma State University (SSU) to encourage development of an OLLI program. [4] The Osher Foundation made a development grant to SSU which quickly attracted an audience of older student members. Encouraged by the success of these two programs, Osher decided to greatly expand his grant support for similar lifelong learning institutes.
In 2002 the Osher Foundation began making program development grants of $100,000 a year for up to three years to launch new OLLI programs. The initial focus was on California, which now has OLLI programs at seven University of California and 16 California State University campuses. In 2004 Osher established a National Resource Center (NRC) at USM to distribute information about effective educational programs for older adults via a web site, a research journal, and an annual conference. In October 2014 the NRC was relocated to Northwestern University's downtown Chicago, Illinois campus. [5]
Under current practices, if an OLLI program has 500 fee-paying members by the end of its fourth year, the university is eligible for a $1 million endowment grant from the Osher Foundation. When it reaches 1000 members, it is eligible for another $1 million endowment grant. As of 2015, the Osher Foundation was supporting 120 OLLI programs at universities and colleges in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. [3]
The Bernard Osher Foundation’s executive director is Barbro Sachs-Osher. [6]
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San Francisco State University is a public research university in San Francisco. It was established in 1899 as the San Francisco State Normal School and is part of the California State University system.
Santa Clara University is a private Jesuit university in Santa Clara, California. Established in 1851, Santa Clara University is the oldest operating institution of higher learning in California. The university's campus surrounds the historic Mission Santa Clara de Asís which traces its founding to 1777. The campus mirrors the Mission's architectural style and is one of the finest groupings of Mission Revival architecture and other Spanish Colonial Revival styles. The university is classified as a "Doctoral/Professional" university.
The University of Southern Maine (USM) is a public university with campuses in Portland, Gorham and Lewiston in the U.S. state of Maine. It is the southernmost of the University of Maine System. It was founded as two separate state universities, Gorham Normal School and Portland University. The two universities, later known as Gorham State College and the University of Maine at Portland, were combined in 1970 to help streamline the public university system in Maine and eventually expanded by adding the Lewiston campus in 1988.
Sonoma State University is a public university in Rohnert Park in Sonoma County, California. It is one of the smallest members of the California State University (CSU) system. Sonoma State offers 92 bachelor's degree programs, 19 master's degree programs, and 11 teaching credentials. The university is a Hispanic-serving institution.
Gerald William Haslam was an author focused on rural and small towns in California's Great Central Valley including its poor and working-class people of all colors. A native of Oildale, California, Haslam has received numerous literary awards.
Mary Tillotson is an American broadcast journalist formerly with CNN, for whom she was a White House correspondent and host of CNN & Co.
Ruben Armiñana is a political scientist who served as the sixth president of Sonoma State University from 1992 to 2016. He is the first Cuban-American to head a campus in the California State University system.
Gregory Michael Sarris is the Chairman of the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria and the current Chair of the Board of Trustees of the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian. Until 2022, Sarris was the Graton Rancheria Endowed Chair in Creative Writing and Native American Studies at Sonoma State University, where he taught classes in Native American Literature, American Literature, and Creative Writing. He is also President of the Graton Economic Development Authority. Sarris is currently the Distinguished Chair Emeritus at Sonoma State University.
The Fairfield Osborn Preserve is a 450-acre nature reserve situated on the northwest flank of Sonoma Mountain in Sonoma County, California. There are eight plant communities within the property, oak woodland being the dominant type. Other communities include chaparral, Douglas fir woodland, native Bunch grass, freshwater marsh, vernal pool, pond and riparian woodland. The flora is extremely diverse including many native trees, shrubs, wildflowers, grasses, lichens and mosses. A diverse fauna inhabits this area including black-tailed deer, coyote, bobcat and an occasional mountain lion; moreover, there are abundant avifauna, amphibians, reptiles and insects.
Berkshire Community College is a public community college in Berkshire County, Massachusetts with its primary campus in Pittsfield. It also has a satellite campus in Great Barrington and classroom spaces in the city of Pittsfield. Established in the 1960s, it is the oldest college founded by the Massachusetts Community Colleges Executive Office.
Barbro Sachs-Osher is a former Swedish honorary consul general in Los Angeles and San Francisco and a well-known philanthropist, chair of the Bernard Osher Foundation and of the Barbro Osher Pro Suecia Foundation.
David Walls is an activist and academic who has made significant contributions to Appalachian studies and to the popular understanding of social movements. He is professor emeritus of sociology at Sonoma State University (SSU) in California, where he was dean of extended education from 1984 to 2000.
The College of General Studies (CGS) is one of the 17 schools within the University of Pittsburgh located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The College of General Studies offers programs of special interest to adults and non-traditional students, including baccalaureate degrees (BA/BS) and standalone certificates. The administration of the College of General Studies is overseen by the Kenneth P. Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences.
Bernard Osher is an American businessman, best known for his work as a philanthropist.
The Foundation for California Community Colleges (FoundationCCC) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization with headquarters in Sacramento, California. Established in 1998 as the official nonprofit auxiliary to the California Community Colleges. The organization is overseen by a Board of Directors, where eleven members serve four-year terms with a term limit of three consecutive terms, for a maximum of twelve consecutive years of service.
Marion Osher Sandler was the co-CEO of Golden West Financial Corporation and World Savings Bank. In 2004, after 43 years running Golden West Financial Corporation, she was described by the Columbia School of Journalism as "the first and longest-serving woman chief executive officer in the United States."
The Fromm Institute for Lifelong Learning at the University of San Francisco (USF) offers noncredit courses with no assignments or grades for adults age 50 and over with no other objective than the love of learning. Organized in 1976 with support from Hanna and Alfred Fromm, the Institute’s program served as a model for the Osher Lifelong Learning Institutes that have been established at over 120 universities and colleges in the United States.
The Sonoma State University Foundation was originally approved by the CSU as a new Auxiliary organization and established as the California State College, Sonoma Foundation for Educational Development, Inc. in 1974, with Articles of Incorporation certified on May 1, 1974. The Foundation continues to maintain its 501(c)(3) not-for-profit status.
A lifelong learning institute is an organized group of people over 50 years of age who meet frequently for college-level study just for its intellectual challenge and social enjoyment.. Unlike continuing education, career development is not an objective of a lifelong learning institute; no credit is earned from any sponsoring college or university. Hundreds of thousands of people over 50 now participate in this intellectual endeavor which did not exist before 1962.
Mary G. F. Bitterman is an American historian and former media executive. She currently serves as president of The Bernard Osher Foundation, a philanthropic organization headquartered in San Francisco that supports higher education and arts. She is a former director of the Voice of America and was the youngest person and the first female to hold that position.
