Awards

Partners in Philanthropy - 2023

Cornerstone Award

About The Roberts family

Dave and Susan Roberts know what it’s like to watch people they love slip into the shadows of memory loss. For Dave, it was his dad. For Susan, her mother. And they know countless others who’ve shared the same pain. So, when searching for research areas where they could direct their charitable giving, Dave and Susan came to a swift conclusion: They wanted to help an organization actively searching for the cause of Alzheimer’s– and a cure.

They found it in IU School of Medicine. Since 2014, Dave, a retired manufacturing executive and auto enthusiast, and Susan, his wife of 50 years, have made gifts of more than $10 million supporting Alzheimer’s and neuroscience research. They’ve also made significant gifts to IU Athletics and the Kelley School of Business. The Roberts’ initial investment was an endowed chair in Alzheimer’s research, which allowed IU to hire world-class researcher, Bruce Lamb, Ph.D. Dr. Lamb has transformed IU’s Alzheimer’s research program, catapulting it onto the world stage.

Aware that there is no time to waste in this fight, they established an endowed fellowship in Alzheimer’s disease. And, knowing the needs of the program, the Roberts expanded their giving to include a drug discovery program and a neuroscience imaging fund, which helped purchase a PET-MRI scanner with a 9-Tesla magnet, one of just two in North America, along with an imaging research fund. Most recently, Dave and Susan made a multi-million-dollar commitment to build out the neuroscience lab space in the School of Medicine’s new Medical Education and Research Tower, scheduled for completion in 2024.

The Roberts love IU and the School of Medicine, and they’re passionate about fighting Alzheimer’s disease. Knowing that research takes time to bear fruit, they’re in this for the duration. There is no doubt that Indiana University School of Medicine could have no finer partners in philanthropy than Dave and Susan Roberts.