Billionaire offers UMass graduates $1k every – however there’s a catch | EUROtoday

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A billionaire philanthropist shocked the graduating class of greater than 1,000 University of Massachusetts Dartmouth college students with envelopes filled with money – however the reward got here with a catch.

Rob Hale shocked the graduating class by pointing to a close-by truck holding envelopes filled with money earlier than safety guards lugged cash-filled duffel luggage onto the stage.

Hale, the founder and chief govt of Granite Telecommunications, Hale is estimated by Forbes to have a web value of $5.4 billion, informed the scholars every would get $1,000.

But there was a situation: They had been to maintain $500 and provides the remainder away.

Hale, who owns a minority stake within the Boston Celtics, stated the best pleasure he and his spouse Karen had skilled of their lives had come from the act of giving.

“We want to give you two gifts. The first is our gift to you,” Hale informed the scholars. “The second is the gift of giving. These trying times have heightened the need for sharing, caring and giving. Our community needs you, and your generosity, more than ever.”

It’s the fourth 12 months in a row that he has given an identical reward to a bunch of graduating college students. Last 12 months it was to college students at UMass Boston, and earlier than that it was to college students at Roxbury Community College and Quincy College.

But the scholars at UMass Dartmouth had no concept prematurely that Hale can be talking. Graduating college students that did not attend the ceremony missed out on the cash. Hale informed college students his path to success had been rocky, after his earlier firm Network Plus filed for chapter in 2002, in the course of the dotcom crash.

“Have you ever met someone who lost a billion dollars before? Hale said, as he joked about giving the students career advice. “I may be the biggest loser you ever met, and you have to sit in the rain and listen to me.”