The UT College of Pharmacy recently received a $1 million gift from alumnus Parviz Boodjeh, the founder, chairman and executive officer of Discount Drug Mart.
"This gift was presented to the University of Toledo College of Pharmacy really out of the love and appreciation my father has had for the university," said Diana Boodjeh-Burke, Boodjeh's daughter, in a podcast from the Office of University Communications.
UT will receive the gift in two parts, with the first endowment of $200,000 to be used for scholarships, said Johnnie Early, dean of the College of Pharmacy. The remaining $800,000 will be used in the construction of eight laboratories that will expand the pharmacy program to a new facility on the Health Science Campus, Early said.
"We always have been recruiting the best and brightest students, and the $200,000 will be used to enhance these existing scholarship programs," Early said.
The college of pharmacy will not be leaving Wolfe Hall, Early said. Instead, it will use this gift to expand its program to the HSC.
The Wolfe Hall building received more than $1 million in donations from the Wolfe Family Foundation, but Boodjeh's $1 million contribution is the single largest gift the College of Pharmacy has ever received from alumni, Early said.
"This is something that he has felt deeply about, and this is something truly coming from him thanking the college," Boodjeh-Burke said. "He really wants this to go towards the students' use and to better them as well as the college."
Boodjeh graduated from UT in 1954 with a Bachelor of Science degree in pharmacy, and 15 years later he opened the first Discount Drug Mart. The Cleveland-based retail pharmacy now has 68 stores across Ohio.
"Boodjeh is a very proud and humble man," said Jeffrey Gold, Health Science Campus provost.
The gift was a way for Boodjeh to give back to the university in return for his success as a pharmacologist and entrepreneur, Gold said. Boodjeh, who often attends UT football games, has, through his business, developed a passion of caring for his patients, his employees and his pharmacies, Early said.
A donation of this magnitude from an alumnus has an important impact on the college, Early said.
"I would expect [the gift] to stimulate others to look at the College of Pharmacy and how they may help us as we enter the new era of growth, development and strengthening [of] our program," Early said.
Further participation from Boodjeh and Discount Drug Mart may be somewhere in the future.
"We are deeply grateful for the University of Toledo College of Pharmacy and look forward to our continued involvement with the university at the level that we are at," Boodjeh-Burke said.
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