This February, we unveiled our newly named Herbert and Nicole Wertheim School of Music & Performing Arts ("The Wertheim") so generously enhanced by the transformative gift by Dr. Herbert and Nicole Wertheim. For decades, Dr. Herbert and Nicole Wertheim, together with their family, have been champions for FIU. In 2019, they announced a $10 million naming gift – the largest ever made to a music scho
ol in the State of Florida. We are humbled by this landmark gift that will provide us with the resources to advance our world-renowned program now and into the future with an expanded curriculum and mission-centric, experiential learning opportunities. The gift will be matched by FIU, which will result in a whopping $20 million all going directly to expand the school’s programs, scholarships, graduate assistantship opportunities for students and support for faculty. Our school is also renovating its physical building, the Herbert and Nicole Wertheim Performing Arts Center, to add a café and community gathering space for students. In recognition of the outstanding contribution of the Wertheims, our School was renamed in honor of the couple. The gift will allow our school to focus on strengthening programs to prepare students to land a variety of arts-related jobs. We will continue to expand our academic offerings to include three new degrees over the next two years. The program is one students and community members have expressed deep interest for and which will provide students with the skills to audition for Broadway musicals and other such prestigious roles. In 2023, we will launch an arts administration program, which will make FIU one of only a few hundred universities across the country offering the degree. The new degree will revolutionize the career possibilities students will be prepared to enter after graduating FIU. We will also unveil a program uniting music and wellness: music therapy. This discipline has increasingly gained attention — as a way to promote physical rehabilitation, wellness and stress management in a wide range of individuals, from children with disabilities and veterans to people with dementia. The Wertheim School of Music & Performing Arts will be working in collaboration with the Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine to roll out the degree. This has been a historic year for us. In Fall 2021, we received one of the most prestigious honors conferred on music schools and conservatories: designation as an All-Steinway School, which recognizes schools that demonstrate a commitment to excellence by only using pianos made by the world’s leading manufacturer, Steinway & Sons. We are also proud to announce that our director of the Wertheim School of Music & Performing Arts, Karen S. Veloz, in collaboration with FIU in DC, recently hosted a dialogue with federal policymakers on arts, humanities and medicine as well as a performance of the Amernet String Quartet — FIU's Artist-in-Residence Ensemble — at the Florida House in D.C. on February 11, 2022. This marks the first-ever Arts Policy Conference by Florida International University.
