Pharmacy school renamed in honor of Alfred E. Mann

The School of Pharmacy debuted its new name early Wednesday afternoon in a ceremony at Pappas Quad: The Alfred E. Mann School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences.

The renaming comes after Mann, an inventor and physicist, donated $112.5 million to the University in 1998. The endowment’s value has since grown to $230 million, $50 million of which will go toward the School of Pharmacy. 

Kari Franson, associate dean for academic and student affairs and professor of clinical pharmacy at Mann, said in an interview with the Daily Trojan that this was the largest naming donation for a school of pharmacy in California, putting the school first and foremost.

“We’re excited that people see the potential in USC’s School of Pharmacy,” Franson said. “It’s a celebration … after everything we’ve been through with the pandemic and creating new vaccines and vaccinating pretty much everybody in Los Angeles, that you get people who are innovators and humanitarian saying, ‘I’m betting on pharmacy.’”

Daryl L. Davies, associate dean for undergraduate education and professor of clinical pharmacy at Mann, praised the renaming as being more inclusive of the all-encompassing studies done at Mann.

“The reason we advocate Pharmaceutical Sciences [as a part of the name] is because we want people to understand that it’s not just pharmacy,” Davies said. “We do drug development and drug discovery. Our graduates go to work at the FDA and CDC. So pharmaceutical science is becoming a very integral part of our program … There’s so much more to pharmacy than just the clinical dispensing of medicine.”

Many important members of the USC community gave meaningful speeches at the event. President Carol Folt, Dean Vassilios Papadopoulos, Suzanne Nora Johnson and Renita Moradian all spoke to the 350 individuals who attended the ceremony.

President Folt talked about USC’s new vision for the Alfred E. Mann School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, noting that “biomedical engineering is going to lead us to our most consequential breakthroughs; that is a place where the spirit of inquiry is so important.”

Folt expressed her appreciation for the Mann family’s endowment, explaining the positive results that will come out of the additional funding for the school.

“The endowment is really designed to support students’ scholarships and advance diversity initiatives that make sure we continue to educate the full talent range in our society,” Folt said. “I want to express my own personal thanks to the family and to the foundation. It is a beautiful gift, and our pharmacy school, I think in that spirit, has innovation built into its own DNA.”

In his speech, Dean Papadopoulos discussed the important role Mann’s donation will play in better supporting the curriculum and pharmaceutical research in a sustainable manner. 

“Mann’s gift will add fuel to our revised strategic plan,” Papadopoulos said. “It focuses in part on curricular changes to ensure the school’s long-standing place. At the vanguard of progress for our field, we will continue to transform how students are educated in all of our degree programs, so they remain prepared to continue pushing forward the frontiers of pharmacy and healthcare to benefit individuals and communities everywhere.”

Moradian, a fourth-year graduate student who was the first to receive a bachelor of science degree in pharmacology and drug development at Mann, said that she hopes additional funding goes into supporting students’ journeys to various competitions and experimental rotation sites. 

“I really do hope that they continue to invest back in their community,” Moradian said. “[I hope they] continue to enable people who might be more disadvantaged — in terms of their ability to afford a four-year postgraduate program — to be able to pursue their dreams of either being a pharmacist one day or pursuing any type of degree at USC in general.”