# The Brearley School

The Brearley School is an Endowment / Foundation based in New York, United States.

## Overview

- **Organization type:** Endowment / Foundation
- **Headquarters:** New York, United States
- **Region:** North America
- **Address:** 610 East 83rd Street, New York, NY, United States
- **Founded:** 1884
- **Assets under management:** $195M (Altss estimate)
- **Website:** brearley.org
- **LinkedIn:** https://www.linkedin.com/school/the-brearley-school/

## Regulatory record

- **Reports private funds:** No

## About

Founded in 1884, The Brearley School occupies a unique niche among American endowments — a private all-girls K-12 school whose board and investment committee have been built with deliberate ties to institutional asset management. The board president, Sue Meng, is a partner and managing director at Duquesne Family Office. The school's endowment, estimated at $195 million, is overseen by a committee that includes Munib Islam, former partner at Third Point, and Gideon Berger, former co-CIO of Blackstone Alternative Asset Management. The institution itself spans three commercial properties on East 83rd and East 87th Streets, plus a field house and the Kunz Art Collection. The endowment invests across buyout, fund-of-funds, growth, turnaround, and venture strategies. Geographic focus remains unspecified, though the institution's New York location and the Manhattan-heavy profiles of its investment committee imply a domestic, coastal orientation. Brearley operates as part of the New York Interschool Association, an eight-school consortium that includes Collegiate School and The Chapin School, sharing after-school programs and select classes. The endowment's scale is modest by university standards but substantial for a K-12 institution. Recent operational details are not publicly available, reflecting a deliberate low profile consistent with its governance model — a board of trustees staffed by senior finance practitioners who oversee capital allocation alongside educational strategy. The school's structural differentiator lies in its governance: a K-12 endowment whose investment committee is populated by principals from Duquesne, Third Point, Blackstone Alternative, Apollo, and KKR. This construction creates an unusual concentration of allocator expertise for an institution of its size, effectively embedding hedge-fund and private-equity DNA into the oversight of a secondary-school endowment.

## Sectors

- Buyout
- Fund of Funds
- Growth
- Turnaround
- Venture (General)

## People

- Sue Meng — President of the Board of Trustees
- Olivia Wassenaar — Treasurer of the Board of Trustees
- Munib Islam — Treasurer and Member of the Investment Committee
- Gideon Berger — Trustee and Member of the Investment Committee
- Joe DiMenna — Trustee
- David Philip — Senior Vice President
- Paula Campbell Roberts — Vice President

## Questions

### Who sits on Brearley's investment committee?

The investment committee includes Munib Islam, former partner at Third Point, and Gideon Berger, former co-CIO of Blackstone Alternative Asset Management. Joe DiMenna, founder of Zweig-DiMenna Associates, is a trustee. Olivia Wassenaar, head of sustainable investing at Apollo, serves as treasurer. David Philip of Goldman Sachs and Paula Campbell Roberts of KKR hold senior vice president and vice president roles respectively.

### How large is The Brearley School's endowment?

The school does not publicly disclose its endowment. Based on institutional peer comparisons and the real estate footprint, Altss estimates the endowment at approximately $195 million.

### How does Brearley's endowment relate to other New York independent schools?

Brearley is a member of the New York Interschool Association, a consortium of eight Manhattan independent schools including Collegiate and Chapin. While the schools share programming, each maintains a separate endowment and investment governance structure.

### Who chairs The Brearley School's board of trustees?

Sue Meng, a partner and managing director at Duquesne Family Office, serves as president of the board of trustees. She brings institutional allocator experience from one of the country's most significant single-family offices.

## Related profiles

- [United Association](https://altss.com/profile/united-association)
- [The Hill School](https://altss.com/profile/the-hill-school)

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Last updated: 2026-08-11T02:43:31.692Z

Canonical page: https://altss.com/profile/the-brearley-school

Maintained by Altss — https://altss.com — methodology: https://altss.com/methodology