Ira Rennert - Philanthropy

Philanthropy

Ira Rennert ranks #132 on Forbes Magazine's list of World Billionaires. He also ranks #29 on the Jerusalem Post's list of the World's 50 Richest Jews.

Rennert and his wife Ingeborg have made many charitable donations to various organizations. They donated $5 million to establish the Wiesel Center at Boston University and $250,000 to the Lincoln Center. They also gave over $1 million to the World Trade Center Memorial and established the Rennert Entrepreneurial Institute of Sy Syms School of Business at Yeshiva University. They have endowed chairs at several different universities, including a chair in Jewish studies at Barnard College, a Chair in Aging Research at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, a Chair in Stem Cell Biology at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and the Ira Rennert Professorship of Business at Columbia University. They also established the Ira Leon Rennert Professor of Entrepreneurial Finance at New York University and founded the Ingeborg Rennert Center for Jerusalem Studies at Bar Ilan University. The Rennerts also helped to fund the restoration of the Western Heritage Wall in Jerusalem (the visitor's center is called The Ingeborg and Ira Leon Rennert Hall of Light). The Rennerts are known to have donated to Rav Aharon Bina's new yeshiva in Israel, Yeshivat Netiv Aryeh, and are additionally honored with a plaque as well as their family upon entrance into the building. They also donated hundreds of Torah scrolls to communities in Israel. The Rennert family also funded the construction for a new mikvah at the Fifth Avenue Synagogue, which was completed in May 2010.