Photo credit: Harvard Medical School
K. Lisa Yang retired from investment banking at First Boston and Lehman Brothers back in 2001, but that hasn’t slowed her down at all. Her energy and a good deal of her money has been going to help students at top universities. She’s on the board of trustees at Cornell, but she’s donated an eye-opening $74.5 million to a list of schools, including Cornell, Harvard, and MIT.
In 2024, she gave another $35 million to help wildlife health efforts at Cornell. They’re addressing issues like endangered big cats in Asia and managing clashes between wildlife and livestock in Africa. Last year, she dropped another $30 million on Harvard to establish the Brain-Body Center, which is focused on curing cognitive and physical disabilities.
Then there’s the $28 million she spent on an engineering research center at MIT, which was the last part of a $200 million project she started with her ex-husband, Hock E. Tan, back in 2017. That’s just the tip of Yang’s philanthropic iceberg. Her other efforts include funding research into autism and bionics using cutting-edge treatments like gene therapy. Definitely Worthy 100 material.
