Steven J. Green and the Green Family Foundation
Creating a Just and Peaceful World
When Steven J. Green started out in business more than four decades ago, his work was largely defined by geographic boundaries. Fast-forward to today, and with little more than a computer, businesses and communities once seemingly worlds apart are now more interconnected than ever.
In this globalized society, Green believes greater international understanding is necessary to be a successful person, and he’s not just referring to business. The former ambassador to Singapore, business leader and philanthropist is helping to advance holistic international understanding through a bold commitment to education in international and public affairs.
He, along with his wife, Dorothea, daughter Kimberly and the Green Family Foundation, has made a $20 million gift to FIU’s School of International and Public Affairs, which is now known as the Steven J. Green School of International and Public Affairs (the Green School).
“I think the interconnectivity of the world today is so close that unless people have a knowledge of other cultures and other political systems, we’re never going to have a peaceful world,” Green said. “To make a political difference, to make a social difference, you have to integrate many factors of lifestyle – health, safety, governance and laws. The Green School deals with the integration of these ideas and truly creates a platform for tomorrow’s leaders.”
During his term as U.S. ambassador to Singapore from 1997-2001, Green spearheaded strategic programs that enhanced U.S.-Singapore alliances in economic development, intellectual property, immigration and national security. Now, the chairman and CEO of Greenstreet Partners is leading the efforts of the Green School’s Strategic Advisory Board to involve top philanthropic, political and diplomatic leaders throughout the world.
“The Green School is a platform from which people can develop a universal understanding,” he said. “The integration of the 72 countries represented in the school’s student body – cultures living together, working together, dealing together – is a real opportunity for universal understanding.”
The Green family gift propels the Green School forward as one of the world’s top academic institutions dedicated to international understanding, economic development, peace and security. In furtherance of the Green family’s commitment, FIU has also renamed its Latin American and Caribbean Center to the Kimberly Green Latin American and Caribbean Center and established the Kimberly Green Scholarship and Dorothea Green Lecture Series Fund. For a man who spent the better part of his career globalizing well-known domestic brands, including Samsonite and Culligan, Green said much of his education came from the new people, new cultures and even the new foods he discovered in his travels. But he said it’s his wife’s giving nature that has long inspired his philanthropic spirit.
Throughout his career, he has found opportunities to make a difference. Some are very personal to him; others are simply attempts to leave the world a little better than how he found it. Green said naming the Green School combines both and is a very personal way for his family to support new ideas and future leaders, while hopefully creating a better world.
Help FIU’s Green School become even better as FIU heads into its next 50 years forward. Learn more by visiting https://sipa.fiu.edu/. Or, give today at https://give.fiu.edu/give-now/school-of-international-and-public-affairs/ .