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Long before he ran for office, Ronald Reagan served as the host of the weekly TV series, General Electric Theater — and as a GE goodwill ambassador from 1954 to 1962. He also traveled to 139 GE plants — inspiring employees with his optimism, entrepreneurial spirit and a belief in innovation. Building on that shared history, GE today announced that it will partner with The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation to become the Presenting Sponsor of the historic Ronald Reagan Centennial Celebration — which is a two-year-long commemoration of President Reagan’s 100th birthday on February 6, 2011. This morning, GE announced details of its $15 million sponsorship — including a fund that will provide 200 four-year college scholarships over the next decade. Later today at the Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California, GE’s Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt will give a talk – which can be viewed live at 6 p.m. Pacific time on the Library’s website — with former First Lady Nancy Reagan among those in attendance.

With nearly 16 percent of the U.S. population living without health insurance — or 45 million people — the lack of access to quality care is a problem that continues to grow. It’s one of the reasons why GE, as part of its healthymagination initiative, committed to a 3-year, $25 million program last October to help increase access to primary care in 10 underserved locations across U.S. Today Milwaukee, Wisconsin became the second city in the U.S., following New York, to receive a grant from the GE Foundation Developing Health program to improve access to primary care. The $1 million will be split between four Milwaukee community health centers — all of which offer health services to patients that are not able to pay.

As we recently reported, 10 of GE’s solar-powered water purification units were shipped to earthquake-stricken Haiti to help with the country’s desperate needs for clean water. Now, seven of the Sunspring units are up and running — with each able to provide safe water for up to 10,000 people per day. Our Sunspring partner, Innovative Water Technologies, was hard at work this week completing installations that bring the total of available clean water in the Port au Prince area to over 40,000 gallons per day. The video below was created and produced by Mark Tchelistcheff of openfilms.net and documents the installation at the SOS Children’s Village orphanage in Santo, Haiti.

Of the $2.5 million that GE has targeted for earthquake relief in Haiti, $1 million will be used to help the next phase of the response effort — recovery. That stage is already underway with solar-powered water purification units now shipping to the devasted country, along with critically needed medical technologies (such as ultrasound, anesthesia and x-ray) and mobile video units to help search and rescue teams. In addition to the $2.5 million pledge, GE employees have donated $1.5 million to organizations supporting the relief efforts, half of which comes from matching grants from the GE Foundation.

GE’s presence has been growing significantly in Africa in recent years — and part of that has been in the form of medical aid to communities in need. This week, a GE team made up of leaders in GE’s African American Forum traveled to Africa to meet with government officials and business leaders — and to visit healthcare facilities where GE has provided solutions that include healthcare equipment and support with water, energy, communications and infrastructure development.