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Last modified: Wednesday, January 11, 2012

$33 million Lilly Endowment grant will transform IU Kelley School of Business' undergraduate program

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Jan. 11, 2012

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Indiana University President Michael A. McRobbie announced today, Jan. 11, that Lilly Endowment Inc. has awarded the university a major new $33 million grant to help transform undergraduate facilities at IU's Kelley School of Business in Bloomington.

This is the largest such grant ever received by the Kelley School in its 92-year history and one of the largest ever received by Indiana University.

The new and renovated facilities will enable program innovations that will elevate the role the Kelley School plays in the economic vitality of the state and will further advance its presence among the world's elite business schools.

Combined with nearly $27 million in private gifts from alumni and strategic partners, all funding for the $60 million renovation and expansion of the 46-year-old, 140,000-square-foot original building is in place.

Planning for the project began in 2005, and trustees voted in December to begin construction this spring with the building's expansion, followed by renovation of the existing building -- one floor at a time. Both phases of the project are expected to be completed within three years.

A focus of the building project will be to create facilities that will enable a technology-mediated experience, allowing Kelley students to interact with companies from across the state and around the world on actual business projects.

The Kelley School also needs more classroom space, as current facilities are 100 percent utilized and the school must routinely turn away many high-quality students each year because of capacity constraints.

"Lilly Endowment's grant for undergraduate business education is another example of its extraordinarily generous legacy of supporting activities at the university that benefit the people of Indiana and beyond, including its past support for student scholarships, our efforts in genomics and neurosciences, in arts and humanities, in information technology, in philanthropy, in economic development and for the Jacobs School of Music, the Maurer School of Law and our libraries," McRobbie said.

"With this support, the Kelley School will continue as one of the world's leaders in business education and help Indiana to develop and retain the best and brightest minds who will drive our state's economy in the future," McRobbie added. "We are indeed grateful for Lilly Endowment's continued generosity and its commitment to advancing IU and serving the people of Indiana."

The Kelley School is one of the largest business schools in the nation and has long been ranked among the top 20 by both Bloomberg Businessweek and U.S. News & World Report. Dan Smith, dean of the Kelley School, emphasized that the building project is more than bricks and mortar. It will enable the types of program innovation that will ensure that the school remains among the finest in the world.

"This is truly a transformational gift for the Kelley School, one that will change the lives of our students and will also elevate the school's role in serving the state," Smith said. "The new facilities will allow the school to more fully execute an experiential learning approach to business education."

"Lilly Endowment is pleased that the new facilities funded by this grant will help secure the Kelley School's standing as one of the nation's leading schools of business," said Sara B. Cobb, Lilly Endowment vice president for education. "These bold, forward-looking plans at the Kelley School of Business will undoubtedly enliven the education of students and faculty alike and will help build the intellectual capital in our state, which we believe is so vital to the future prosperity of Indiana."

Smith said that the new and renovated facilities will help undergraduate students engage with companies in Indiana and around the world in ways not possible today.

"Our intent is to use the school's vast network of relationships to help create opportunities for companies within the state," Smith said. "Our goal is to have a significant impact on the economic vitality of the state by working on projects with Indiana companies to help them grow and to create employment opportunities within their respective communities. We expect these experiences to also increase interest among Kelley students to pursue careers with Indiana companies following graduation."

The project will also create space to house the Indiana Business Research Center, which currently operates in off-campus facilities. The IBRC provides a wide range of economic and demographic information services to help companies, government organizations and nonprofit organizations make better decisions.

"Our vision with the IBRC is to integrate it more fully into the academic programs of the school, in particular our new programs in business analytics," Smith said. "We see a win-win-win opportunity where students can acquire firsthand experience by working as assistants in the IBRC, and the IBRC in turn increases its capacity to serve organizations within the state."

IU Bloomington Interim Provost Lauren Robel noted that the Kelley School has long played an integral role in the university's outreach mission to the state of Indiana and in helping the state retain its best young minds.

"This most recent gift to IU by the Lilly Endowment helps retain the state's best and brightest who are interested in studying business by ensuring that Kelley will remain among the most innovative and important business schools in the world," Robel said. "Kelley provides an extraordinary option for Indiana residents interested in studying business, and I have been particularly impressed with the school's emphasis on community engagement and outreach."

Over the past four years, Kelley students have contributed more than 61,000 hours of volunteer service to community nonprofit organizations, an implied value of over $1 million.

Facts about the building project:

• Architects: BSA LifeStructures, Indianapolis.
• Total cost of new construction plus renovation of existing facilities: $60 million.
• Sources of funding: 100 percent private gift support. No state funds or tuition revenue will be used.
• Grant management: The IU Foundation, the fundraising and investment management organization serving the university, will manage the grant.
• Current facilities: The existing building was completed in 1966. As a reference point, the average age of facilities for peer business schools is less than 10 years.
• Size of new construction: The first phase of the building project will involve a 71,000-square-foot expansion of the Kelley School's original building, which will complement the adjacent Godfrey Graduate and Executive Education Center, which was completed in 2002. Once this is finished, the second phase will begin and will involve a major renovation of the current facility. The project will add more than 20 new classrooms.
• Space highlights: In addition to increased classroom space, the renovated building will house a behavioral lab for researchers, a stock trading room with state-of-the-art informational resources and a business communications lab. The new building will also feature a variety of nonstructured learning environments -- places where students can meet between classes and work together on projects. Some of these collaboration spaces will be fashioned within the traditional classrooms to allow extensive after-hours use of the rooms.
• There will also be small meeting rooms, a new Student Collaboration Room and a Student Commons Room. This space is strategically located at the new main entry off 10th Street and will provide an opportunity for students to meet with each other, including a collaboration room for study sessions or student meetings.
• A new 2,000-square-foot multipurpose room on the third floor will be used for large gatherings.

About the Kelley School of Business:

• In 2011, Bloomberg Businessweek ranked the Kelley School undergraduate program sixth among public universities and 18th overall. Also in 2011, U.S. News & World Report ranked the school sixth among public universities and 12th in the nation overall. More than 3,000 colleges and universities offer degrees in business.
• Kelley has the largest number of living alumni in the world of any business school at more than 95,000. Of those, 25,000 live in Indiana.
• Currently, about 2,000 students from Indiana major in business at IU, while another 1,200 students from Indiana minor in business.
• The Kelley School is a "destination point" for Indiana's best and brightest. The average SAT score for Indiana students majoring in business is 1,304.
• Overall, more than 5,000 undergraduate students major in business at the school, and another 2,000 students minor in business.
• Kelley provides more than $2.7 million annually in "full-ride" scholarships.
• The Kelley School's four-year graduation rate is 94 percent.
• Over 500 companies and not-for-profit organizations recruit students from the Kelley School every year.
• Over 160 Indiana companies recruited students from the Kelley School in 2010-11.
• Kelley students are engaged in more than 300 "real-world" projects annually for companies across Indiana.
• More than 600 students from outside Kelley, such as music, journalism and informatics, interview with companies at the Kelley School every year.
• During the 2010-11 academic year, 91 percent of all students who worked with the Undergraduate Career Services Office accepted an offer for a full-time job or gained admission to graduate school.
• Kelley students annually contribute more than 15,000 hours in volunteer service to Indiana not-for-profit organizations, with an implied economic value of over $250,000.
• Among all business schools, Kelley's faculty are ranked seventh in the nation on faculty scholarship by the Chronicle of Higher Education.
• The school's faculty are ranked eighth among public universities based on the number of downloaded research publications, according to a recent Social Science Research Network study.
• More than 450 research and teaching awards have been bestowed upon Kelley School faculty.
• Annually, Kelley hosts four conferences for life sciences organizations across the state, attended by more than 600 leaders of such organizations.
• Kelley's annual business conference, held in Indianapolis each year, draws more than 1,200 attendees from Indiana companies and not-for-profit organizations.
• The Indiana Business Research Center provides and interprets the economic information needed by the state's business, government and nonprofit organizations, as well as users of such information throughout the nation.
• The school has 12 research centers and institutes that bring together students, faculty and corporate leaders in various fields of business and industry.