Ken Grossman of Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. and his wife, Katie Gonser, have presented UC Davis with a $2 million gift to support the campus’s brewing science program. The gift establishes an endowment to provide ongoing funding for a full-time staff brewing position, focused on excellence in hands-on brewing education in the UC Davis Department of Food Science and Technology.
The Sierra Nevada Brewing Company Endowed Brewer position will be dedicated to mentoring and managing students and teaching assistants, maintaining the campus brewery and its equipment, and assisting in teaching brewing classes.
“This endowed brewer position will allow us to provide outstanding practical brewing experiences for our students as we continue to align hands-on training with the best theoretical education,” Charlie Bamforth, the Anheuser-Busch Endowed Professor of Malting and Brewing Sciences at UC-Davis, said for a press release. “Students don’t get that combination in most other brewing programs.”
“My family and I have supported the brewing program at UC Davis for nearly two decades,” Grossman said. “Charlie Bamforth is not only an expert in brewing science, technology and engineering, but a frequent guest speaker at our brewery and a close, personal friend. The ideals that he and the rest of the staff instill in the students are the very same principles that have guided our success in craft brewing for the past 36 years.”
The first Sierra Nevada Endowed Brewer will be Joe Williams, who has been serving as a staff researcher at UC Davis.