Philanthropist garners acclaim

  EDWARD LIN/Daily Bruin Gary Winnick
(right) receives the 2001Jacoby International Award from Chancellor
Albert Carnesale for his contributions to
enhancing international understanding.

By Kelly Rayburn
Daily Bruin Reporter

Chancellor Albert Carnesale, U.S. Representative Jane Harman and
former Secretary of Defense Bill Cohen lauded him with praise.

UCLA students from Russia, the United States, China, India,
Morocco and Chile gathered at a dinner in his honor.

Both Gov. Gray Davis and former Gov. Pete Wilson spoke well of
him, too.

UCLA’s Dashew International Center acknowledged the deeds
of international financier and philanthropist Gary Winnick with the
2001 Jacoby International Award for his dedication to enhancing
cross-cultural understanding and world peace. The award was
presented at a dinner gala at an elegant Beverly Hills hotel.

Winnick is the founder and chairman of Global Crossing Ltd., a
Fortune 500 company.

“Truly all of us are witness to a revolution,”
Winnick said upon receiving the award. “A revolution of
knowledge, based on the unlimited flow of information.”

“This revolution has left an impact on every aspect of our
lives.”

But Winnick said his work is not done, and the economic gaps
between continents and between rich and poor are still far too
wide.

Though already a huge corporation, Global Crossing is very much
a work in progress. The Global Crossing fiber optic network is not
yet completed, but seeks to be a “seamless infrastructure
that is global in scope,” and will connect five continents,
enabling easier worldwide Internet communication, according to
their Web site. Global Crossing services more than a third of the
world’s undersea cable lines.

After the event, Carnesale said many different types of people
admire and respect Winnick because of his views and actions.

“The idea that he had, that he brought to fruition with
Global Crossing, brings people together from all over the
world,” he said, adding that Winnick’s ideas have
nothing to do with party politics, and can be appreciated by people
of all ethnic backgrounds and religions.

Earlier, Carnesale presented the award to Winnick, calling him a
“treasured member of the UCLA family,” and commending
him for his “outstanding commitment to international
understandings.”

Since its founding in 1997, the company’s employment has
grown from four to 17,000, the chancellor said.

Cohen, who spoke earlier in the evening, said Winnick was a
visionary.

Winnick, though, was not the only honoree of the night ““
Carnesale, Harman, Cohen, Winnick himself and many others in
attendance expressed admiration for the work done by
Winnick’s wife Karen and the Dashew Center, and for UCLA as a
whole.

After receiving the award, Winnick thanked his wife for her
dedication.

“Earlier this evening I ran into someone who had not met
me before, and he said “˜Mr. Karen Winnick, it’s nice to
meet you.'” he said, “So I guess it’s true:
behind every man, there is a very strong woman.”

Winnick said he was honored to receive the Jacoby award from the
Dashew Center, an organization whose philosophy is so similar to
his own.

“I have always been a tremendous admirer of the work done
by the Dashew Center,” he said.

Harman, meanwhile, praised UCLA as a haven for cross-cultural
understanding.

“Wouldn’t it be terrific, if the future leaders of
this country, and of Russia, and of China, could attend this great
urban university together,” Harman said as she introduced
Carnesale.

Of the 800 in attendance, about 150 of them were students, and
many of those were international students who were invited by the
Dashew Center.

Some of the international students spoke about how the Center
helped them get adjusted to life at UCLA and in the United
States.

“Basically they took us and showed us how to survive in
Los Angeles,” said James McPhee, a Chilean doctoral student
studying water resources. “They showed us how things
worked.”

Arati Bhattacharya, a graduate student from from India who is at
UCLA on a two-year program, said the center ran an orientation
program for international students.

Members of the center picked up 600 international students at
the airport, helped them get driver’s licenses and social
security cards, and aided them in finding apartments.

Dashew Center workers were thanked profusely by many
international students after the week-long orientation, said
fourth-year French student Lisa Levin, who worked as a student
intern for the center last summer.

Besides being the founder of Global Crossing, Winnick is a board
member for the Museum of Modern Art, the Simon Wiesenthal Center,
Special Olympics and Hillel International.

Cohen said he was as impressed by Winnick’s philanthropy
as he was by his success in business.

“When I think about Gary Winnick’s contribution
““ the hospitals, the libraries, the medicines, the art
““ you know why we have some 800 people here tonight,”
he said.

Through a video message before Cohen’s speech, Gov. Davis
called Winnick a good friend and also gave his praise for
Winnick’s philanthropic deeds.

“I am impressed not so much by how he’s made his
success, but more how he’s used his success to give back to
the community,” Davis said.

The Dashew Center’s Jacoby Award is named after Neil H.
Jacoby, founding dean of UCLA’s Anderson School and one of
the founding members of the International Student Center.

Previous recipients include Ted Turner, Kirk Douglas, Armand
Hammer, Tom Bradley and former UCLA Chancellor Charles E.
Young.

The ceremony was held at the Regent Beverly Wilshire Hotel.
Though impressed by the banquet and the hotel’s glitz, many
of the students did not know too much about Gary Winnick or what
his company does.

Badr Dahak, who is from Morocco and is a graduate student in
design, had this to say about the event: good food.