Jeffrey J. Feil and Sanford I. Weill
Sanford I. Weill
For more than 40 years, Sanford I. (Sandy) Weill’s visionary leadership and dedication have helped guide Weill Cornell Medicine to the forefront of academic medicine. An inspirational leader who served as chair of the Weill Cornell Medicine Board for nearly 20 years, Mr. Weill has been a trailblazer in every campaign since the mid-1990s and helped raise more than $3 billion for the institution. Now Board chair emeritus, he will once again serve in an integral role as co-chair of Weill Cornell Medicine’s current We’re Changing Medicine campaign.
Transformational support from Mr. Weill and his wife of more than 66 years, Joan, and the Weill Family Foundation, have been a driving force that shaped the growth of Weill Cornell Medicine. Together, their lifetime giving to Weill Cornell Medicine and Cornell University totals over $650 million spanning three decades, and their philanthropy has advanced research and medical education for the benefit of patients around the world. In appreciation for their unparalleled dedication and enduring commitment, the institution was renamed in their honor in 1998.
“This is truly an exciting time in science and health care and to be part of Weill Cornell Medicine. Joan and I think of this institution as family,” says Mr. Weill, who is also a Cornell University graduate. “Weill Cornell Medicine is a collaborative institution that demonstrates that working together and creating partnerships allow us to make real and substantial progress.”
Most recently, in 2019, the Weills, and the Weill Family Foundation, together with Robert S. Dow and The Starr Foundation, partnered to give more than $160 million for scholarship. This gift to the We’re Changing Medicine campaign established a life-changing program that provides debt-free education to medical students with financial need. The program has already provided dozens of students with the opportunity to seek a medical school education without enduring crushing debt.
Joan and Sandy Weill
In 1998, Joan and Sanford Weill and the Weill Family Foundation donated a historic $100 million to the medical college – at the time the largest in Cornell University’s history. Their subsequent gifts have spanned several phases, providing $100 million to the Advancing the Clinical Mission campaign in 2001, and an unprecedented $250 million to the Discoveries that Make a Difference campaign in 2007 that helped Weill Cornell achieve a new milestone in translational research.
In 2013, a $100 million gift from Joan and Sandy Weill and the Weill Family Foundation launched the Driving Discoveries, Changing Lives campaign, establishing the Joan and Sanford I. Weill Center for Metabolic Health and the Weill Global Health Research Laboratories. In 2014, Weill Cornell named its Department of Medicine the Joan and Sanford I. Weill Department of Medicine in honor of the couple’s longstanding dedication and historic philanthropy.
The Weill name has become synonymous with excellence, innovation and the world’s best and brightest students, scientists and doctors. It can be found across the Upper East Side campus, including at the Weill Education Center and Weill Greenberg Center. The Weills’ passion and impact is also global: As a way to extend top-tier medical education around the world, Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar opened in 2008, and the Weill Bugando School of Medicine in Tanzania was named in honor of the Weills in 2007. Mr. Weill was also instrumental in bringing together The Technion – the Israel Institute of Technology – and Cornell University to create Cornell Tech on New York City’s Roosevelt Island in 2008.
“Joan and Sandy led with their first $100 million gift in 1998, when nine-figure gifts were still new to philanthropy,” says Dr. Augustine M.K. Choi, the Stephen and Suzanne Weiss Dean. “But what’s almost more meaningful is that they have followed up that initial investment with numerous additional gifts at the nine-figure level. For the Weills, however, it is not always just about the money, but the time, energy, intelligence and enthusiasm they devote to the causes they are really passionate about. That’s truly transformational philanthropy.”
Jeffrey J. Feil
Jeffrey J. Feil, co-chair of Weill Cornell Medicine’s We’re Changing Medicine campaign and a vice chair of the Board of Fellows, is among the institution’s foremost benefactors, championing patient care, research and education for more than three decades.
Passionate about enhancing the student experience at Weill Cornell Medicine, the Feil family, as part of this campaign, generously committed $55 million toward the creation of a new 18-story student residence. When completed in 2025, the 148,000-square-foot building will serve as the primary student residence and create a vibrant hub of student life within convenient walking distance of the main Upper East Side campus. Spacious apartments and modern amenities will significantly improve the living and learning experience for 300 students, supporting their physical and emotional well-being.
“For four generations, my family has benefited from the extraordinary medical care and scientific innovation that flourish at this institution,” says Mr. Feil. “This campaign provides a superb opportunity to support the brilliant and hard-working students who contribute so much to the Weill Cornell Medicine standard of care.”
In 2016, a gift of $12.5 million from the Feil family funded the creation of the Feil Family Student Center, a spacious, modern, comfortable facility that was completed in 2019 and increased by nearly 75 percent the square footage of dedicated space for students to study, collaborate and socialize.
At the 2017 wall-breaking for the Feil Family Student Center.
Mr. Feil’s relationship with the institution began in 1975, when his mother, Gertrude, was under the care of Dr. Rees Pritchett. Later, with Mr. Feil’s father, the couple endowed the Gertrude and Louis Feil Scholarship, which has provided more than $3 million in student aid. The fund supports approximately 10 medical students each year, enabling them to pursue their medical education without the burden of overwhelming student debt.
For more than three decades, the entire Feil family has championed research, education and patient care at Weill Cornell with generous gifts of more than $160 million. Their philanthropic legacy has supported student scholarships, physician training in neurology and other disciplines, two professorship endowments (one in medicine and another in neurology), two Clinical Scholar Awards in multiple sclerosis and established the Weill Greenberg Center’s Judith Jaffe Multiple Sclerosis Clinical Unit. In 2010, the Gertrude and Louis Feil Building on East 61st Street was named in honor of the family’s longstanding support for advancing research.
Since joining the Board of Fellows in 2003, Mr. Feil has been involved in several expansive and metamorphic philanthropic campaigns. Mr. Feil has served as co-chair of Weill Cornell Medicine’s Development Committee for the past eight years, a position he began in 2013 with Weill Cornell Medicine’s successful Driving Discoveries, Changing Lives campaign. That effort provided significant funding for research, recruitment and program enhancement.
In 2013, the Feil Family Brain and Mind Research Institute (BMRI) was established through a $28 million gift from the Feil family. The Institute is a hub for basic and translational neuroscience research, with dozens of faculty members, including Dr. Matthew Fink, the Louis and Gertrude Feil Professor and Chair of the Department of Neurology, Dr. Costantino Iadecola, director of the Feil Family BMRI and the Anne Parrish Titzell Professor of Neurology, and Dr. M. Elizabeth Ross, director of the Center for Neurogenetics in the Feil Family BMRI and the Nathan E. Cumming Professor of Neurology. Over the past several years, Institute investigators have published hundreds of papers in high-impact scientific journals, reporting on promising new research in areas including stroke, depression and Alzheimer’s disease. “Jeffrey Feil has had such a significant impact on the institution over the years, for our patients, our researchers and especially for our students,” says Board Chair Jessica Bibliowicz. “His dedicated leadership has been vital to Weill Cornell Medicine’s success and we are fortunate to have him as co-chair of the We’re Changing Medicine campaign.”
