Just a decade after completing his undergraduate degree at Caltech, Conan Gu invests in the next generation of students.

As he attended high school in Shanghai City, Conan Gu (BS ’13) aspired to study science and engineering in the United States. But as he sent off his college applications amid the global financial crisis in 2008, he began to wonder if he would ever realize that dream. “I was coming from a single-parent family in China, and U.S. tuition is no joke,” Gu recalls.

Then he received what he calls “heavenly news”: He had been accepted to Caltech and awarded the Milton and Rosalind Chang Scholarship. He wouldn’t have to worry about paying tuition for the entirety of his undergraduate career. “It was a peerless offer,” Gu says.

Gu credits the financial support with helping him succeed academically. “That scholarship enabled me to focus on studying and performing,” he says. His undergraduate experience included a Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship under the mentorship of Nobel laureate Paul Greengard at The Rockefeller University, study abroad at the University of Cambridge, and an internship with Merrill Lynch Investment Banking in Hong Kong, where he crossed paths with his now-wife, Claire, then a UCLA student interning in the same building.

Somehow, between rigorous coursework, hands-on research, and internships, he also found time to join the basketball team. “On top of attending a preeminent university, getting to play basketball in the States was like a second dream coming true,” he says—adding, with a laugh, “even though I was deep, deep in the bench.”

Ready for Anything

After graduating in 2013, Gu forged a career in finance and is now a portfolio manager with a New York-based asset management company. The quantitative analytical skills he honed at Caltech have been useful in his profession, he says, but the patience, focus, and discipline he developed at the Institute have been even more elemental to his success. “Caltech challenged me to go above and beyond,” Gu says. “I’m not afraid to tackle difficult problems, confident that if I spend my full efforts, there’s nothing I cannot figure out.”

Gu believes none of his accomplishments would have been possible without the generosity of Milton Chang (MS ’65, PhD ’69), whom he calls “a wonderful person and a wonderful mentor.” The two met while Gu was at Caltech and have exchanged emails in the years since. “Dr. Chang has been so supportive of my career and whatever I’ve wanted to do in life, never asking for anything in return,” he says.

Commemorating a Milestone, Looking to the Future

Gu always had it in the back of his mind that he would one day pay Chang’s generosity forward. Last year, as he and Claire were expecting their first child, the time seemed right. “We were looking back on our life, the things that had happened over the past 10 years and led us here, and we felt so blessed,” Gu says. “I told myself, ‘Conan, you can’t procrastinate!’”

So, he and Claire celebrated the 10th anniversary of his graduation in a big way: a pledge to establish the Conan Y. Gu Family Scholarship as well as a generous donation to augment the Milton and Rosalind Chang Scholarship Fund. “My wife and I felt like it was the right thing for us to do, to give something back directly to that program,” Gu says. “The whole reason I’m in a position to make this gift is that Caltech and Dr. Chang supported me back in ’08.”

The Gus’ gifts advance the Initiative for Caltech Students, a campaign that aims to raise $250 million to support the student experience, including $100 million for undergraduate scholarships.

“Our goals are to attract world-class students to the Institute, and to give them the best possible experience,” says Vice President Kevin Gilmartin, the William R. Kenan, Jr., Professor of English and holder of the Allen V.C. Davis and Lenabelle Davis Leadership Chair for Student Affairs. “Scholarships make it possible for our talented students to fully immerse themselves in their studies and research.”

Gu remains engaged with the Caltech community and is particularly excited about research under way in neuroscience and environmental science, fields he believes will only become more important in the coming years. “Techers understand that this work is bigger than just ourselves,” Gu says. “Our Caltech education focuses us on making the world a better place.”