$12 Million Investment from Alumna Mary Tolan to Chicago Booth’s Healthcare Initiative

The University of Chicago Booth School of Business has received $12 million in commitments from University of Chicago trustee Mary Tolan, MBA ’92 (XP-61), and her husband, Edward Grzelakowski, to advance the work of its Healthcare Initiative, which integrates business and medical points of view on the complex challenges facing the healthcare sector. In honor of Tolan’s extraordinary philanthropy, the work will continue under the auspices of the new Tolan Center for Healthcare.

Founded in 2020, the Healthcare Initiative is a hub for the diverse disciplines engaged in healthcare research at Chicago Booth, and it fosters collaboration across the University of Chicago and beyond. With the naming of the Tolan Center for Healthcare, the initiative will expand its impact and deepen its commitment to real-world solutions in healthcare.

“With Mary’s remarkable investment, Chicago Booth will have the resources to further advance critical faculty research and innovative healthcare curriculum; facilitate opportunities for students and alumni to transform the healthcare system; and apply the school’s practice of rigorous inquiry to improve the healthcare industry,” said Madhav Rajan, dean and George Pratt Shultz Professor of Accounting.

The center is composed of a community of faculty members, policymakers, industry leaders, alumni, and current students who bring analytical, empirical, and humanistic approaches to bear to improve the healthcare sector.

“Our family is excited to be supporting the significant impact and innovation we see at the Center for Healthcare. Looking toward the future, we see an opportunity for Chicago Booth’s impact in healthcare to become a national beacon for advancement in care innovation and quality,” said Tolan of her gift.

Reflecting on Tolan’s support for the university, University of Chicago President Paul Alivisatos, AB ’81, remarked, “Mary’s generosity will affect many more than those at the University of Chicago. By giving our faculty and students the tools to move research and healthcare forward, her commitment will help them address important challenges and broaden access to leading care.”

Tolan is founder and managing partner of healthcare private equity firm Chicago Pacific Founders. Earlier in her career, she founded R1 RCM and led the company’s growth with a focus on revolutionizing patient access and revenue cycle processes for healthcare providers. The company grew to become a top provider of comprehensive end-to-end healthcare revenue cycle management services and population health management services.

Tolan has been a longtime supporter of Chicago Booth and the University of Chicago. Her previous philanthropy has included a gift to the Robert J. Zimmer Odyssey Scholarship and a commitment to name the George Shultz Innovation Fund at the university’s Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. The Honorable George P. Shultz, former dean of Booth (1962–69) and President Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of State (1982–89), was also Tolan’s mentor and friend.

Led by faculty codirectors Dan Adelman, Charles I. Clough Jr. Professor of Operations Management, and Matthew Notowidigdo, David McDaniel Keller Professor of Economics and Business and Public Policy Fellow, Chicago Booth’s Healthcare Initiative has made strides in a number of areas since its inception. Notable highlights have included:

• Showcasing and building awareness of how The Chicago Approach™ can benefit the study of the healthcare system. A key example is the collaboration between Adelman’s Healthcare Analytics Lab and UChicago Medicine (UCM), in which MBA students work together with Booth PhDs/post-docs, UCM residents, and data science students. Together, they apply business operations optimization to help healthcare organizations solve real-world challenges identified by clinicians and hospital leaders.
• Facilitating faculty and PhD student research. Many of the toughest challenges in healthcare are fundamental business problems. These issues can be solved with insights from analytical tools and data that have supported innovation in other industries. Recent faculty research has included Better Health Economics: An Introduction for Everyone—a textbook in which Notowidigdo and his coauthor provide a framework for thinking about the healthcare industry and its place in the US economy.
• Supporting curriculum innovations and a new healthcare concentration. This work has created opportunities for MBA students to learn about the dynamic nature of the healthcare system, and a healthcare concentration that started in 2023–24.
• Supporting programming to develop medical trainees in the business of medicine through Booth’s joint MD/MBA program and a new joint MBA program offering an MS in biomedical science.

Considering the possibilities Tolan’s investment will help create, Adelman and Notowidigdo said, “Mary’s tremendous gift will accelerate our efforts to help MBA and PhD students develop the tools and rigorous thinking necessary to transform the healthcare system worldwide to better serve humanity. There is no better place to do this than at Chicago Booth and the University of Chicago, where the quality of our students and faculty is unparalleled. We are very excited to continue this work at the Tolan Center for Healthcare.”

An excerpt of this story appeared in the Fall 2025 print issue of Chicago Booth Magazine.