Robert Morris University announced on Friday an $18 million gift from the S. Kent Rockwell Foundation and the Kent Rockwell family, the largest personal gift in the university’s history and a tremendous investment in entrepreneurial and business education.

The gift, which was announced during the inauguration ceremony of President Michelle L. Patrick, names Robert Morris University’s business school the Rockwell School of Business.  RMU is already home to the S. Kent Rockwell Fellowship for Entrepreneurship, a two-year program for juniors and seniors designed to support students who are building entrepreneurial ventures and initiatives by providing a rich environment of knowledge, practice, coaching, and opportunity.  This program, along with the newly established S. Kent Rockwell Professorship of Entrepreneurship, are both endowed as part of the Rockwell gift.  

“This is a transformational moment for Robert Morris University,” said President Patrick, former dean of the business school. “With this gift, the Rockwell family has tied its legacy to ours and propelled our institution into its next century. Inspired and enabled by their generosity, we will continue to cultivate the spirit of entrepreneurship in everything we do and change the lives of our students for generations to come.”  

The Rockwell School of Business is Robert Morris University’s founding academic school rooted in the institution’s beginning as a school of accountancy in 1921. Today the school serves almost a third of the graduate and undergraduate students at RMU.  

“We have been thrilled by the results of our work with RMU in creating the S. Kent Rockwell Fellowship in Entrepreneurship and are excited to be expanding our commitment to the university and its students starting with the Rockwell School of Business,” said S. Kent Rockwell, chairman of the S. Kent Rockwell Foundation. “We believe the spirit of entrepreneurship moves us forward and has the potential to change the world for the better.  Our partnership with RMU creates new opportunities that will ensure that its graduates continue to bring this spirit to their businesses, their careers, and their communities.”    

The S. Kent Rockwell Foundation aims to improve four general areas of philanthropic endeavor: conservation, education, community, and entrepreneurship and innovation. Located in Pittsburgh, PA, the foundation is particularly interested in allocating efforts to environmental improvement programs that can provide a positive impact on communities, educational systems and individual efforts and goals such as entrepreneurship and innovation.

“Robert Morris University embraces a culture of entrepreneurship not just within the Rockwell School of Business, but across the entire institution,” President Patrick said. “Like the Rockwell family, we believe that the spirit of entrepreneurship and the embrace of innovative new ideas can change the world. We’re grateful for this generous gift from the S. Kent Rockwell Foundation and the S. Kent Rockwell family and the many opportunities it will help create for our students.”