$5M gift endows PIK professorship

Penn President Amy Gutmann announced that the University has received a gift of $5 million from Emeritus Trustee Stephen Heyman, a Wharton 1959 alumnus. The donation will be used to endow the I. George Heyman University Professorship, a Penn Integrates Knowledge Professorship named after Heyman’s father.

This is the third professorship Heyman has endowed. He previously the Stephen J. Heyman Professorship in the Wharton School and the Bess W. Heyman Professorship in Sociology in the School of Arts and Sciences.

“We are indebted, once again, to Steve Heyman’s visionary support of scholarship and teaching at Penn,” Provost Vincent Price said in a statement. “This gift will help keep our faculty at the forefront of academic eminence for decades to come.”

In addition to the endowed professorship, Heyman has made a number of other monetary gifts to the University.

“By supporting and creating more Penn Integrates Knowledge professorships, Steve and other wonderful donors are enabling us to build on the strongest foundation of faculty at Penn — by attracting even more of the most brilliant scholars, teachers and interdisciplinary thinkers to Penn who extend the scope of our programs and increase Penn’s impact on the world,” Gutmann said in a statement.

The PIK program recruits scholars whose teaching and research combine knowledge across disciplines, and PIK professors have joint appointments between two schools in the University. Penn has received commitments to endow 15 PIK professors. Ten professors currently have PIK appointments.

Heyman also received the Alumni Award of Merit in 2000, recognizing his commitment to Penn.

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