In January, the Board of Trustees of the California State University approved the establishment of the Grimm Family Center for Agricultural Business at CSU Bakersfield, made possible by an extraordinary endowment created by Mrs. Grimm-Marshall and Kari Grimm Anderson that reflects their abiding commitment to the future of the region’s leading industry.
The $5 million pledge of support for the Center is the single largest gift in the 50-year history of the university. The gift coincided with the 50th anniversary of family-owned Grimmway Farms and honors the legacy of the company’s founders, Rod and Bob Grimm.
The Grimm Family Center for Agricultural Business will offer unprecedented educational opportunities to CSUB’s agribusiness students, who will learn by doing, getting experience directly out in the field, working with experts immersed in the day-to-day enterprise of running successful agribusinesses.
The Center is the latest expression of support for education by Mrs. Grimm-Marshall, who founded the Grimm Family Education Foundation, an organization dedicated to closing the achievement gap for students in rural areas of Kern County and increasing wellness and good health through an experiential Edible Education program. The Foundation fostered an environment of student excellence and well-being through the “seed funding” of Grimmway Schools and the creation of Edible Schoolyard programs.
The Foundation’s mission came to life in August 2011 with the opening of Grimmway Academy, a public charter school in Arvin, serving 280 students in grades K-3. Today, Grimmway Schools operates a network of public charter schools, serving nearly 1,500 diverse scholars in grades K-8.
Mrs. Grimm-Marshall joins a list of outstanding President’s Medal recipients whose names are synonymous with integrity, leadership and philanthropy going back to 1997, when former President Horace Mitchell bestowed the first awards, to Mrs. Millie Ablin and Mr. George Martin.
President Zelezny bestowed the President’s Medal on CSUB Foundation Board President John Nilon last year. Nilon is a member of the CSUB Alumni Hall of Fame and former trustee for the California State University Board of Trustees.
President Zelezny will present Mrs. Grimm-Marshall with the medal at a later date.
The president announced the award at a recent virtual event honoring the President’s Associates, the most enduring giving society at CSU Bakersfield. Through the President’s Associates, student and faculty research is possible at CSU Bakersfield. Among the exciting, groundbreaking research being done is a study of disease in carrots, analysis of the soil that makes valley fever thrive in Kern County, geological studies to predict earthquakes in the Kern River Gorge, and the identification of a mutation in a cancer gene that could help physicians plan treatment.
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