The bequest is the largest gift in the School's history and one of the largest gifts ever to a U.S. dental school. Schoenleber died on Jan. 7, 2005, at the age of 84, but the full amount of the gift was only recently realized upon final settlement of the estate.

The gift will provide funding specifically for Penn Dental Medicine's Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery and its dual-degree residency program, a rigorous, six-year program in which students earn a medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, a two-year certificate of general surgery and a certificate in oral and maxillofacial surgery from Penn Dental Medicine. “The role of the oral surgeon is unique and multidisciplinary- that of both dentist and surgeon,” Penn President Amy Gutmann said. “Louis Schoenleber understood this role well, and we are enormously grateful for his generosity to Penn.”

For more information on this extraordinary gift to Penn please see:
http://www.upenn.edu/pennnews/article.php?id=1891