$10 Million Gift Endows Carnegie Mellon Deanship

Carnegie Mellon University Trustee and alumnus Lane Bess, and his wife, Letty, have made a $10 million gift to endow the dean's chair for the Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences.

The gift will allow Dean Richard Scheines and his successors to incentivize innovation around the college's strategic initiatives and emerging priorities across its nine departments and programs, and in its faculty and students. Carnegie Mellon will recognize this transformational commitment by establishing the Bess Family Dean's Chair of the Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences. Scheines, who was recently reappointed to a second five-year term, will be the first holder of the chair and will be installed in October.

"The essential work in Dietrich College leads the way we study humanity with the goal of creating real-world impact. This extraordinary gift from Lane and Letty creates new opportunities for Dean Scheines to advance the interdisciplinary work that is a hallmark of the college's rich culture," President Farnam Jahanian said. "The Bess's commitment to education and research will create unprecedented opportunities to advance human knowledge and improve the human condition."

Lane Bess, a 1983 Dietrich College graduate with a degree in managerial economics, is a global pioneer in technology and venture capital, launching startups, and growing small and medium-sized businesses to large-scale companies.

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