The creation of the fund formalizes and enhances the Council’s long-standing commitment to making strategic philanthropic investments in initiatives that benefit business and management education globally. Such initiatives have included the Ph.D. Project to increase the number of minority business school professors, and the Management Education Research Institute, which provides funding for faculty research on issues affecting management education, among others.

“We recognize that substantial change will only occur with substantial investment,” GMAC President and CEO David A. Wilson noted. “That is why we think the board’s action can make a difference. These are investments against which the Council expects no return other than the advancement of the objectives for which grants are made.”

GMAC Board Chair Marci Armstrong, associate dean of graduate programs at the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University, said that the board is now developing a formal structure and specific plans for the fund, which is set to launch in early 2009.