UIndy lands $5M gift from graduate and retired Lilly exec Stephen Fry

The University of Indianapolis has landed a $5 million gift from the retired top human resources officer at Eli Lilly and Co., who is directing the money to three new programs at the business school.

The university said Friday morning that the gift comes from Stephen F. Fry, a first-generation college student from rural Indiana who graduated in 1987 with a business degree and rose over the decades to become senior vice president of human resources and diversity at Lilly, a position he held for 12 years before retiring in 2022.

Instead of going toward a building project, a common use for donations at colleges, the money will go to programs designed to give students real-world business experience along with their classroom experience.

“I was less interested in building a building or anything like that, than I was in making sure students get access to both the education that will benefit them and experience in the real world, experiences that I think will help benefit them when they start their careers in business,” Fry told IBJ.

Most of the money will create the Fry Business Scholars Program, in which an annual cohort of students will receive experiences in and out of the classroom, supervised and mentored by a director. Students will have funding to participate in national conferences, case competitions, internships and other immersive experiences, mentored by alumni and community leaders.

The gift also establishes the Fry Distinguished Lecture Series to bring leading thinkers and innovators to campus each year.

And the Fry Faculty Innovation Fund will support curriculum and program innovations to help the business school reflect the needs of the business world.

UIndy President Tanuja Singh said Fry’s gift is among the largest received by the university from an individual in the past decade. Fry, who is a member of UIndy’s board of trustees, also donated $1 million in 2020 to strengthen the career development center on campus. Officials at the center meet with every student on campus to ensure they are ready for interviews and help them find jobs and internships.

“I just want to express my most sincere thanks to Steve,” Singh told IBJ. “He’s helping us transform the way we think about business education, ensuring that our business students are very, very connected with industry, that they have a service component to their education, and at the time they graduate, they are prepared for not just what the world needs today, but what it is going to need in the future.”

UIndy is probably best known for its health care programs, such as nursing and physical therapy, Fry said. Its business school is lesser known, but Singh is trying to elevate its stature with these sort of real-world experience opportunities, he said.

Fry grew up in Millhousen, Indiana, population 149, about 60 miles southeast of Indianapolis. His internship at Lilly began fortuitously, after a different internship, at a Cincinnati bank, fell through at the last minute. A business professor of his at UIndy made some phone calls and helped him land a replacement internship at the Indianapolis-based drugmaker.

He said he has since tried to help UIndy students get real-world experience so they could succeed.

Fry declined to discuss the source of his wealth, other than to acknowledge much of it came from Lilly compensation.

“Of course, Lilly was very good to me,” he said. “I had a great career there, over 36 years. Luckily, I made some other investments that also turned out very well. … Personally, I don’t think it matters where the money came from. It matters what I’m giving it for.”