Cowan Communication Arts Produces a Video Program
Featuring Michael Douglas for The Campaign for UC Santa Barbara

The Campaign for UC Santa Barbara is the University’s first comprehensive campaign to raise private funds to ensure UCSB's excellence for future generations. The original goal was to raise $350 million in private gifts and pledges. More than half that amount was received in the "quiet phase" of the campaign.

The public phase of the campaign began with a celebratory kickoff event on campus that featured a video message from Michael Douglas, the Academy Award winner and UCSB alumnus, who serves as Honorary Chair of the campaign. Cowan Communication Arts worked with the UCSB Development Department to produce the Michael Douglas video program featured at the gala campaign dinner.

Academy Award winner Michael Douglas, who graduated with a B.A. in dramatic art from UCSB in 1968, is serving as Honorary Chair of The Campaign for UC Santa Barbara. In the video played at the kickoff event to mark the start of the campaign's public phase, he talked about the campus that he holds dear, and his role in the campaign.

"This is a time of unprecedented change and opportunity for UC Santa Barbara," said Douglas. "It's also a time of great excitement and anticipation, as the campus marshals resources to capitalize on the vibrant intellectual assets and extraordinary potential that distinguish it. Building on the tremendous momentum created this past decade under Chancellor Henry Yang's leadership, it is private support that will provide the critical margin of excellence to achieve our potential as a world-class university.

"As alumni and friends of this university, we all have a role to play as ambassadors for UCSB. I've made a commitment to help, and I sincerely hope you'll join me and other leaders of this effort through your contributions of time and energy as well as financial support. My hope is that everyone will lead by example."

Douglas contributed $1 million toward the construction of a Center for Film, Television and New Media. In recognition of the gift, the lobby of the center's public theater will be named in his honor. He is a member of the center's distinguished advisory board. "I have watched UCSB become an international leader in education, and as an alumnus and benefactor, I have the personal satisfaction of having played a part in that transformation," said Douglas. "This exciting center, with its public film theater, represents the very best in teaching, research and public service that a campus can offer."