By Nancy McCann
The biggest benefactor in the university’s history has done it again.
Retired entrepreneur Kate Tiedemann and her partner, Ellen Cotton, have pledged $3 million to endow the deanship of the business school, which was named for Tiedemann after she donated $10 million in 2014.
Tiedemann and Cotton “are huge contributors to this university, and this is just another example of how much they care about what we do here,” Regional Chancellor Martin Tadlock told the St. Petersburg Campus Board on Jan. 24.
Tadlock also announced that retired business executive Lynn Pippenger – another big benefactor – has contributed $150,000 to support business students who study abroad.
The names of the three donors already adorn the business school. The college is named for Tiedemann, the building for Pippenger and the atrium for Cotton.
The latest gift from Tiedemann and Cotton comes with a caveat, Tadlock said. When consolidation of the three universities in the USF system is complete, Tiedemann’s name must remain on the business school, which is now called the Tiedemann College of Business.
Under the rules of the agency that accredits the university, a unified USF can have only one college for each academic discipline, like business or education.
All three universities in the USF system now have a college of business headed by a dean. Under the reorganization contemplated by consolidation planners, the Tiedemann College of Business would become the Tiedemann School.
It would still have a dean, who would report to an executive dean overseeing business education on all three campuses.
Tiedemann’s $10 million gift to the university in 2014 was the largest donation in USF St. Petersburg’s history.
It marked another milestone in the remarkable life of Tiedemann, who immigrated to the United States from Germany in 1955 at the age of 18. She had not finished high school and did not speak English.
She found work as a maid in New York and then as a clerk at a business that sold surgical instruments. She eventually founded her own ophthalmic surgical supply business, which made her a millionaire many times over.
When she retired to Pinellas County, Tiedemann formed a bond with the university and its College of Business, which until 2017 was scattered in buildings around campus.
At the Campus Board meeting, Tadlock also announced a gift from the Foundation for a Healthy St. Petersburg to the university’s Family Study Center, which is led by psychology professor James McHale. The gift brings the foundation’s contributions to $1 million, Tadlock said.
