DURHAM, N.C. -- Duke University's Fuqua School of Business dedicated the Lafe P. and Rita D. Fox Student Center on Friday, Nov. 1.

The center is named in memory of Duke's longtime friends and supporters Lafe and Rita Fox. Their children, Rick Fox and Carol DeJoy, provided the naming gift for the center through their personal commitments and the Fox Family Foundation.

Participating in the dedication events were Duke's President Nannerl O. Keohane; Fuqua's Dean Douglas Breeden; Roy Bostock, a member of Fuqua's Board of Visitors and chair of its Capital Campaign Steering Committee; Rick Fox and other Fox family members. As part of the program, board member Janet Hill, chair of the Bank of America Faculty Award Committee, presented the 17th annual Bank of America Faculty Award, Fuqua's highest faculty honor, to David A. Hsieh, the IBM research fellow and professor of finance.

Lafe Fox was a 1933 Duke business major graduate who remained a lifelong student of the business and accounting profession and was active in Duke alumni affairs. Out of respect for one of his Duke accounting
professors, Fox provided his first gift to Fuqua in 1991 to establish the L. Palmer Fox Professorship in Management Accounting.

As a successful businessman and entrepreneur who helped build Pipe Machinery Co. (PMC) in Cleveland, Ohio, Fox exhibited the character, integrity and leadership that the school encourages in all of its students, Breeden said. "It is very fitting, therefore, that the student center bears the Fox name," Breeden noted.

The dedication of the $27.9 million student center marks the completion of the latest addition in the school's facilities expansion plan. Construction of the 48,100-square-foot center began in January 2001. Included in the overall space is a 36,500-square-foot adjoining four-story mini-tower that includes the office of the dean, boardroom and other administrative/faculty offices.

Because of its central location between the east and west wings of the Thomas F. Keller Center and its function, the student center is designed to serve as the hub of Fuqua campus life. The complex contains three food-service areas providing a range of dining options, including a hot food bar, a deli for made-to-order sandwiches and a 24-hour self-serve food bar. It also features a winter garden for a casual place to mingle, talk or work; changing rooms with showers and student lockers; and a student communications center equipped with walk-up computing, copier, fax and mail center. Other space includes seminar and conference rooms, an outdoor patio, a Ph.D. student area and additional office space.

"Duke University and The Fuqua School of Business are grateful to the Fox family for this most significant naming gift and for what it will mean in the life of the school for generations to come," Breeden said.