Main Content

Fundraising Campaign Launched by the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management.

September 9, 2022

Toronto – Building on the launch of its new academic plan in July, the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management last night launched an ambitious new fundraising goal of $250 million as part the University of Toronto’s Defy Gravity campaign. Through investments in cross cutting research and teaching initiatives, the Rotman School aims to develop responsible and purposeful business leaders with support for faculty, research, teaching and learning.

The campaign is an integral part of Defy Gravity: The Campaign for the University of Toronto, the largest university campaign in Canadian history, which seeks to raise $4 billion. In addition to the ambitious financial goal, Defy Gravity sets forward an expansive vision and goal for alumni engagement. The campaign seeks to involve 225,000 alumni as volunteers, mentors, donors, participants, and leaders. Overall, the University aspires to attract one million individual acts of engagement.

Purpose into Action: Academic Plan 2022–2027, provides the overarching framework for the School’s priorities including four aspirational goals to advance the frontiers of management thinking, deliver transformational management education, take insight to impact, and create a more diverse and welcoming community. The development of the plan was a collaborative effort, incorporating strategic insights from leaders at the School along with valuable input from the broader Rotman community.

“Our bold fundraising campaign is set against a backdrop of unprecedented change—a devastating pandemic, the accelerating effects of climate change, the growing uncertainties of geopolitical conflict, and the turmoil stemming from unresolved and long-standing social injustices. Now more than ever, we need creative solutions for an ever-changing future, with the Rotman School playing a critical role in developing business leaders who can tackle these challenges,” says Dean Susan Christoffersen. “Our new academic plan maps out the goals, priorities and specific initiatives by which we’re putting our purpose into action.”

Half of the campaign’s goal is designated for students and teaching including life-changing scholarships for both undergraduate and graduate students, curriculum innovation, and experiential learning opportunities such asmentorship, international experiences, flexible internships, global consulting projects, as well as industry-led projects.

The campaign will also help the school retain and attract outstanding scholars and researchers through investments in chairs, professorships and fellowships as well as support the important work of the school’s cutting-edge research centres, institutes, and labs. These centres of teaching and learning advance the frontiers of management thinking while educating students, business leaders and policymakers. The school amplifies its impact through applied research studies focused on real business challenges, practical case development and training, and a multitude of events, speaker series, forums and conferences that engage the broader community.

The Rotman School will occupy five floors in a planned 14-storey academic wood tower expected to be amongst the tallest mass timber and concrete hybrid buildings in North America which will provide new homes for the School’s renowned executive programs and research labs. The School is also investing in another capital project, a new building for Rotman Commerce, the highly respected undergraduate program offered in partnership with the University’s Faculty of Arts and Science.

Further information on the campaign and how to support it is online.

The Rotman School of Management is part of the University of Toronto, a global centre of research and teaching excellence at the heart of Canada’s commercial capital. Rotman is a catalyst for transformative learning, insights and public engagement, bringing together diverse views and initiatives around a defining purpose: to create value for business and society. For more information, visit www.rotman.utoronto.ca.

-30-

For more information:

Ken McGuffin
Manager, Media Relations
Rotman School of Management
University of TorontoVoice 416.946.3818

E-mail mcguffin@rotman.utoronto.ca