Real Estate

Real-estate tycoon gives Yale $25M to build dorm

Yale law students will soon sleep a little better at night.

Robert Baker — a New York real-estate tycoon whose family has amassed stacks of degrees from the Ivy League stronghold — has donated $25 million for a dormitory at Yale Law School.

The gift will fund half of a project to buy and renovate a campus building into a complex that will house law students as well as administrative offices and seminar rooms. The new dorm opens in 2018.

Despite the top US ranking of Yale Law School — whose alumni include Bill and Hillary Clinton — many graduates don’t go into high-dollar professions, opting instead for public service and non-profit jobs, Baker said.

“We’ve looked and looked, and could find no other major donor,” he said.

Baker earned his Yale law degree in 1977, 21 years after finishing college there.