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Ex-professor’s widow gives $4 million to Fresno State
FRESNO — The widow of an education professor at California State University, Fresno gave the school $4 million Friday for its teaching programs.
Marion Kremen gave the money to honor her late husband, Benjamin Kremen, a pioneer in guidance counseling programs at the university. He taught at the school from 1950 to 1976. He died in 1995.
Kremen said the gift is intended to strengthen the graduate program her husband established, and to create a doctoral program.
The school currently offers an education doctorate jointly with the University of California at Davis, but is among campuses in the CSU system seeking legislative approval to offer independent doctorates.
The gift is the second-largest for an academic program at the university. Sid Craig gave $10 million in 1992 for the school of business that bears his name.
President John D. Welty will ask the CSU Board of Trustees next month to rename the education school The Benjamin and Marion Kremen School of Education and Human Development.
Marion Kremen, 91, a classical pianist educated at the Peabody Institute of Music in Baltimore has taught elementary school, served as a principal and taught at various universities, including Johns Hopkins, Marshall, Michigan State and Fresno State.
