Posted by Joseph Y. Calhoun, III

I have been a permanent Miami resident since 1990. My parents moved here in 1978 and I lived here part time during college and visited frequently during my Navy days. I consider myself a Miami person and I am proud of my city. I am especially proud of the University of Miami which has transformed itself from Suntan U to a well respected research university, mostly due to the hard work of Donna Shalala. Shalala has done a particularly good job at fund raising (via Miami Herald):

Shattering fundraising records in Florida, the University of Miami has raised almost a billion and a half dollars in an aggressive, seven-year campaign that promises to propel UM into a more elite league of schools.

The university raised $1.4 billion, surpassing its own billion-dollar goal — an achievement that has coincided with a significant bounce in the school’s placement in various national rankings.

”No one in Florida had ever tried to raise this kind of money before, so there wasn’t any kind of competition to raising this kind of money,” UM President Donna Shalala said in an exclusive interview with The Miami Herald.

So imagine my surprise when I saw this in the Herald this morning:

The University of Miami announced Thursday it has been awarded $14.8 million in stimulus money to help it build a neuroscience and health annex at its Coral Gables campus.

The University of Miami is a private university. Annual tuition costs $36188. I can’t afford to send my child to school there, but I am forced to subsidize their building program? After they’ve raised over $1 billion? Really?