The Transformative Generosity of Fred Luddy
Thank you, Dean Acharya.
And I want to thank all of you for joining us here in Luddy Hall for what is, as you will hear, a truly historic occasion for Indiana University and the School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering.
I want to join Dean Acharya in welcoming the members of the school’s Dean’s Advisory Council, who are in Bloomington for their fall meeting.
And I am pleased to welcome the chair of the Indiana University Board of Trustees, Mike Mirro, who serves on the council, and to also welcome Trustee Melanie Walker, who is with us as well.
Would you join me in welcoming our Trustees?
As I am sure most of you are aware, Indiana University is in the midst of a yearlong celebration of its 200th anniversary. So, it gives me great pleasure, during this, our Bicentennial Year, to make a major announcement about the future of Indiana University’s renowned School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering.
Today, I am delighted to announce that IU alumnus and information technology pioneer Fred Luddy, whom we are honored to have with us today along with members of his family and other colleagues and friends, has made an extraordinarily generous gift of $60 million—the second-largest private gift ever in the entire history of Indiana University—to the IU School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering.
I am also very pleased to announce that in recognition of Mr. Luddy’s continued leadership and his landmark support of the school’s mission, the school will be renamed, by approval of the Trustees of Indiana University, the Luddy School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering, effective immediately.
The overall goal of Mr. Luddy’s extraordinarily generous gift is to accelerate the progress of the school as one of the best of its kind in the world.
A major portion of the gift will fund new scholarships and fellowships for undergraduate and graduate students, as well as new endowments that will support the creation of faculty chair positions and professorships.
It will also provide for the establishment of the Luddy Center for Artificial Intelligence, a new, innovative, state-of-the-art center that will be part of the school and that will focus on artificial intelligence and machine learning and their impact on digital health and medicine. The gift will fund the construction of a building, which will house the center, and which will feature state-of-the-art teaching and learning spaces dedicated to supporting IU faculty and students doing pioneering work in AI and machine learning and to encouraging and enhancing interdisciplinary collaborations.
The Luddy Center for Artificial Intelligence will help establish IU and the Luddy School as being at the forefront of research and education in artificial intelligence and digital health. And further projects in this area, based on IU’s extensive disciplinary strengths in related areas, will be formed as additional support is obtained from other sources.
We are enormously grateful to Mr. Luddy for his willingness to support a major initiative in this area at IU.
On behalf of Indiana University, I want to offer our most sincere thanks once again to Fred Luddy for his dedicated service to the school, and for this extraordinarily generous gift.
It will touch the lives of countless students, faculty, and staff. And it will have a transformative impact on the mission of the Luddy School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering as it continues to help build a vibrant culture of building and making across the Hoosier state.
All of us are profoundly grateful.