The University of Haifa announced plans on Monday to establish a new graduate school, following receipt of one of the school’s largest-ever single gifts.
The Bloom School of Graduate Studies, named after Boston-based businessman and philanthropist Bradley M. Bloom, will be located in new quarters within the University of Haifa’s main Mount Carmel campus. Professor Irit Akirav from the university’s department of psychology will serve as its founding dean.
Part of the new school, the exclusive Bloom Fellows Program “will provide 24 doctoral candidates and 20 postdoctoral fellows with the resources, training and opportunities they need to secure faculty positions or prestigious postdoctoral fellowships in Israel and abroad.”
“The Bloom School of Graduate Studies will serve as an academic magnet for students who are intellectually independent, driven by a curiosity and willing to take chances in creating scholarship unrestrained by boundaries,” said University of Haifa president and professor Ron Robin.
Bloom is chairman of the university’s board of governors. In 1986, he co-founded Berkshire Partners, a private equity firm with more than $20 billion in assets under management.
“Through programmatic innovation, increased financial resources and a new state-of-the-art learning space, the university will attract an increased number of high-quality graduate students, provide an academic and programmatic platform in its multiversity model and create a space where others will want to join them over time,” said Bloom.
