Gifts to establish CU-Boulder capital-markets program

BOULDER — A new program at the Leeds School of Business at the University of Colorado Boulder will enhance undergraduate curriculum offerings in property rights, thanks to an endowment of more than $2 million and an additional $1.2 million three-year operating support agreement from CU-Boulder alumni William and Jane Reynolds.

The new Hernando de Soto Capital Markets Program, named for a Peruvian economist, will explore the history and efficacy of different approaches to property rights across formal and informal global markets.

A longtime real estate entrepreneur and Boulder native, William Reynolds and his family also gave more than $2 million to the Leeds School to establish the William W. Reynolds Endowment for the CU Real Estate Center.

“At the heart of the Hernando de Soto Program is an entrepreneurial mindset, giving students not only historical context but also a framework for innovative thinking,” said CU-Boulder chancellor Phil DiStefano in a prepared statement. “It’s exciting to see alumni give back in a way that will deeply impact the academic experiences of students, as well as the expertise and prowess of students in their careers.”

Primary atop de Soto’s scholarly work is the notion that when entrepreneurs lack a legal framework to record, report, license and sell property, as well as to engage in legally enforceable business contracts related to that property, they face a legal limbo depriving them of important incentives to create and share new business innovations with the world.

“De Soto’s philosophies revolve around economic empowerment,” Reynolds said. “Understanding the complexities of property rights and how to apply them will truly enable future generations to enact positive change through capitalist ideas.”

Part of the de Soto program will include the Leeds School’s newly redesigned World of Business course, required for first-year students, beginning this fall. Incorporating games, simulations, historical and current contexts, the redesigned course will introduce students to the problems that businesses — through economic and legal infrastructures — are positioned to address.

The de Soto program also will include the development of an international experience for students; a new scholarship coordinated with the Leeds School’s Center for Education on Social Responsibility, and a newly hired scholar.

Reynolds founded the W. W. Reynolds Cos. real estate brokerage in Boulder in 1966 and grew it into a commercial real-estate development, leasing and property-management firm. He helped form the CU Real Estate Center in 1992 and served as president in 1997 and 1998. He also was the first president of the University of Colorado Real Estate Foundation, and was vice chairman of the Center of the American West from 2010 to 2014. He currently serves as director emeritus of that board.

on Facebook on LinkedIn