Education alum, health care leader commits matching gift to employee campaign
October 2009
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Cheryl and Wayne T. Smith, both 1968 College of Education graduates, matched the college's contributions to the 2009 Faculty Staff Campaign. | Wayne T. Smith, a 1968 College of Education graduate, has never settled for being second best in his professional life.
His attention to detail and desire to be the best have fueled his rise as a national leader in the health care industry as chairman, president and CEO of the Tennessee-based Community Health Systems
 , the nation's largest publicly-traded hospital company. So when Smith, then chair of the college's "It Begins at Auburn" Campaign Committee, learned last year that the college finished second among Auburn University's 13 academic units with a participation level of nearly 82 percent in the 2008 Faculty Staff Campaign, he encouraged the college to set the pace for alumni and university giving through 100-percent participation.
"I'm ecstatic that we rose to the occasion,'' Dean Frances Kochan said of the college's 2009 achievement.
The College of Education helped set the standard for giving among campus units during the 2009 campaign by achieving a 100 percent participation level for the first time in the drive's history.
Smith and his wife, Cheryl, who is also a 1968 graduate of the college, surprised Kochan by matching $13,000 of the contributions made by the College of Education's faculty and staff.
The Smiths' willingness to acknowledge College of Education employee contributions is unprecedented.
"It was a very pleasant surprise, but it's symbolic of the kind of people Wayne and Cheryl are,'' Kochan said. "They believe in the transformative powers of education and in the mission of our college. By achieving a 100-percent participation level, our faculty and staff demonstrated that they believe strongly in the critical role our college and university share in preparing students to be competent, committed and reflective professionals and citizens.
"It's certainly an example of the Smiths, not to mention our faculty and staff, living by the Auburn Creed's assertion that Auburn men and women believe in education," Kochan continued.
In 2006, the Smiths committed $1 million over five years to create the infrastructure for the college's research enterprise, which now includes the Office of Research and Innovation — a service and resource center for college faculty seeking external grant funding. In one year, the Smiths' gift has paid dividends through a near doubling of the average number of annual grant submissions made by faculty. In addition, two distinguished professorships and an endowed undergraduate scholarship are credited to Mr. Smith through contributions made on his behalf by the Humana Corporation
, where he worked for 23 years as president and chief operating officer.
Since Mr. Smith joined Community Health Systems in 1997, the company's net revenue increased from $742 million to $10.8 billion in 2008 - an industry-leading 28 percent. The company owns, operates or leases more than 130 general acute care hospitals in 29 states. In the last eight years, Smith has been selected by readers of Modern Healthcare
as one of the top 50 influencers in the "100 Most Powerful People in Healthcare'' poll. Under his leadership, Community Health Systems has been consistently recognized as one of the "Best Big Companies in America'' in Forbes' Platinum 400.
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