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Meet the Miami mergers who donated $5 million to bring solar panels to campus

<p>Graham (left) and Sharon Mitchell (right) speak at the Flip the Switch event where their donation and plans for the solar panel sustainability park were unveiled. </p>

Graham (left) and Sharon Mitchell (right) speak at the Flip the Switch event where their donation and plans for the solar panel sustainability park were unveiled.

It was the first day of the fall semester of 1969, and Sharon Mitchell was running late for class. 

She lived in the freshman female dorm at Ox College (now home to the Oxford Community Art Center) and had a journey across the brick-paved streets of Uptown and tree-lined sidewalks of Miami University’s campus to reach her chemistry lab in Kreger Hall. 

The room was packed full of students by the time she arrived, and the only open spot was next to a tall, witty boy wearing glasses. She immediately sensed the good chemistry between them.

Graham Mitchell asked her on a date a month later. By 1973, they were married, and just over a month ago, they donated $5 million back to the university that brought them together.

On Tuesday, Sept. 24, the Mitchells commemorated their donation by “flipping the switch” on Miami’s energy and announcing a new solar field and sustainability park that will go behind Young and Hillcrest Halls.  

The couple said it feels like a natural progression for Graham (’73) and Sharon (’73) to donate towards Miami’s carbon neutrality goals after careers spent in sustainability. However, before they held top positions in some of Ohio’s most prominent companies and agencies, they were just two Miami students.

“We had such a good experience at Miami,” Graham said. “... We feel so positive about our experience at Miami and now, what Miami is trying to do, even today, that we feel it’s a good investment to make.”

Graham earned his undergraduate degree in zoology before completing his master’s degree in Miami’s new master’s of environmental science in 1976. As a student, Graham founded one of the first environmental clubs on campus and pushed to implement recycling on and off campus. While pursuing his master’s, he worked in the Institute for the Environment and Sustainability (IES) as a research assistant.

Sharon graduated from Miami with a degree in chemistry. She was involved with undergraduate research and student government and found that she enjoyed the process of applying research in the big picture. 

The Mitchell’s did not venture far from the place where they met, choosing to stay in southwest Ohio for the entirety of their long and storied careers. 

Graham found his calling at the Ohio EPA, where he worked in water pollution and eventually led teams cleaning up heavily polluted superfund sites. These included sites at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and at Fernald, a former Cold War uranium processing plant 30 minutes south of Oxford that has now been turned into a nature preserve, in no small part due to his work. After retiring in 2006, his passion for sustainability remained, as he served on the boards of the Cincinnati Nature Center and the Ohio Environmental Council.On the other hand, Sharon spent her whole career at Cincinnati-based Proctor and Gamble (P&G), where she propelled from an entry-level position in research and development to eventually becoming the senior vice president for research and development in global fabric care. Throughout her time at this Fortune 500 company, she earned multiple patents and worked with sustainability in mind. She said she believes one of her greatest accomplishments was compacting laundry liquids, which greatly reduced the amount of plastic needed in packaging.

Despite being busy transforming sustainability and environmental landscapes in southwest Ohio, the Mitchell’s continued to remain involved at Miami. Graham currently serves on the College of Arts and Science advisory board, and Sharon serves on Miami’s Board of Trustees. 

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“We’ve been thinking about things we wanted to do, you know, the impacts we wanted to have on Miami after we're gone,” Graham said.

Between their roles during the past decades were more donations, including a $4 million gift for scholarships for women in STEM and investments in IES, for which they were awarded the Spirit of Philanthropy Award in 2020.

Neither Sharon nor Graham’s families come from wealth, and the couple attributes their ability to donate such large sums of money to their careers, specifically Sharon’s position at P&G, and their practicality with finances. They never viewed their wealth as something to be hoarded, but as a way to give back to the people, places and institutions that they care for, especially if it contributes toward a sustainable future. 

Their legacy of philanthropy and involvement at their alma mater made it an easy decision for President Gregory Crawford to reach out to the Mitchell’s after signing the Presidentsʼ Climate Leadership Commitments in September 2020.

“He had this really big, cool idea, but it was a $50 million project, and we were like, ‘Well, that's neat, but we don't have $50 million,’” Sharon said. “So we met with him and said, ‘We're really interested. We love the idea. We'd like to find a way to help get it jump started.’”

Now with their name and $5 million donation enshrined in Miami’s sustainability progress, the Mitchell’s hope the solar panels will not only help Miami reach its renewable energy goals, but also appeal to students. 

“They can do as many projects as they want,” said Will Sayner, a junior majoring in botany with a co-major in environmental science who spoke at the unveiling event. “But if they don’t connect to the student body a little bit more, it’s harder to entice students to want these kinds of things on campus.”

Now with solar panels and a sustainability park being built at a prominent entrance to campus, the Mitchell’s said they feel optimistic about the impact their donation will have on students and institutions alike.

“Sustainability down the road should be part of everyone's job, no matter what they’re doing,” Graham said before Sharon Mitchell finished his sentence.“You want to weave [sustainability] into everybody's DNA.”

nortonsm@miamioh.edu

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