Paul Soros

Mr. Soros founded Soros Associates, a port construction company, in Chicago, and Paul Soros Investments, in New York. Mrs. Soros is a retired social worker. Mr. Soros, 84, and his wife, Daisy, 81, gave $25-million to the Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans, in New York, to support higher education for immigrants and their children. The nonprofit, which Mr. and Mrs. Soros created in 1998, awards immigrants to the United States and their children two years of full tuition and help with expenses so they can pursue graduate study in any subject at any U.S. university. To date the organization has supported more than 380 students. The couple came to the United States from Hungary in 1948 with only about $1,500, and while Mr. Soros had been accepted to both Columbia University, in New York, and Harvard University, in Cambridge, Mass., he couldn’t afford the tuition at either institution. So he chose to enroll at the Polytechnic Institute of New York University, in Brooklyn, N.Y.