Professor Finds Many Ways to Strengthen Penn
Edward B. Shils, W'36, G'37, GR'40, L'86, GL'90, GrL'97, the George W. Taylor Professor Emeritus of Entrepreneurial Management at the Wharton School, is an alumnus who does not do things by halves. Rather, he tends toward multiplicity.
A Penn faculty member and a practicing attorney for most of his life, Dr. Shils founded the Wharton Entrepreneurial Center and helped create the Penn-Israeli Exchange Program, the Wharton Small Business Development Center, the Shils Lecture Series in the Law School, and the Shils Zeidman Minority Entrepreneurial Fellowships.
In 1998, with his family and friends, he endowed the Edward B. and Shirley Shils Professorship in Arbitration and Alternative Dispute Resolution in the Law School. Last year, he established a second chair - the Edward B. Shils and Shirley R. Shils Term Professorship in International Management in the Wharton School.
"My life is at the University," says Shils, "and the thing that I love most is teaching." At 87, Dr. Shils still teaches two classes a week. In fact, it is his love of teaching that inspires his philanthropy. Professorships, Dr. Shils points out, attract top faculty by making salaries competitive and acknowledging excellence. Term chairs give the University "a special edge," he says, in attracting and rewarding outstanding younger faculty.
Dr. Shils is also actively involved in fundraising for the Wharton School… and the Law School… and the Dental School. He has been so successful in his advocacy of the Dental School that he has just been asked to join its Board of Overseers. What will Edward Shils do next? Who can say? Whatever it is, we know that he will do it with originality and vision. And he will probably do it more than once.
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Edward and Shirley Shils share a love for Penn and a fondness for Penn degrees. Shirley has three Penn degrees, the Shilses' daughter, Nancy, has just earned her third Penn degree, and their grandson is in the undergraduate school.
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