MARCH 12 • 2020 | 39
Ron Weiser Gifts $10M for U-M’
s
New Real Estate Center
Ron Weiser, chair of the University of
Michigan Board of Regents, gifted $10
million to the U-M Stephen M. Ross
School of Business last month to help
expand student courses with the launch
of a new real estate center.
The new Weiser Center for Real Estate
will give students the opportunity to learn
from real estate professionals and apply
their knowledge with practical training.
The center will also work alongside other
schools on the U-M campus, including the
A. Alfred Taubman College of Architecture
and Urban Planning and the Gerald R.
Ford School of Public Policy.
Weiser, who is Jewish, graduated from
the Ross School of Business in 1966 and
is the founder of a national real estate
company, McKinley Associates Inc., based
in Ann Arbor.
The new center will offer undergrad-
uate and graduate courses ranging from
real estate finance to sustainable devel-
opment. It will also help Ross further
develop U-M’
s current real-estate certifi-
cation program, in coordination with the
Taubman College. A minor in real estate
will also be curated.
Catholics. Yet he marvels at the similarities
between them and their Jewish partner.
“I have a couple close Jewish friends and
we always talk about being Jewish and being
Christian and how close they are. The main
thing of religion is to love one another. That’
s
the ground we’
re all on,
” he says.
One of their attorneys, Alex jests, has even
joked that Eckhous is, in fact, more Chaldean
than Jewish: after all, Abraham originally
came from Ur of the Chaldeans before jour-
neying to Canaan.
“Even our dialect is similar,
” Alex says
with a smile. “Chaldeans speak [a form of]
Aramaic; Jews say shalom, we say shlonukh.
It’
s amazing how close we are.
”
BUILDING THE BUSINESS
In 2015, the trio patented a process for creat-
ing a concrete block speckled with chips that
absorb the sun’
s ultraviolet rays and give off a
blue, green or aqua hue at night. But only in
the last half-year or so has business begun in
earnest.
In that time, Glow Path has finalized a
contract with a manufacturer in Southern
California, showcased at the World of
Concrete fair in Las Vegas and booked doz-
CORRIE COLF STAFF WRITER
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continued on page 40
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