Elizabethtown College Dedicates New Cutting-Edge Keen ’77 Family Business & Entrepreneurship (FBE) Laboratory

(L-R): President Betty Rider, Ava Barton ’27, Billy Valdez ’25, Elizabeth “Bets” Keen ’77, and Sandu Petru in front of the new lab. 

The Elizabethtown College School of Business recently dedicated the new Keen ’77 Family Business & Entrepreneurship (FBE) Laboratory in Honor of Dr. Petru Sandu on the first floor of the Hoover Center for Business. The FBE Lab serves as an innovative, state-of-the-art space for all students to work on their entrepreneurial and other business projects.

A dedication ceremony held on Sept. 26 officially opened the space.

“Due to the highly experiential learning nature of entrepreneurship and family business, the need for a dedicated entrepreneurial space has emerged,” Elizabethtown College Professor of Entrepreneurship Sandu Petru said. “The lab serves not just as a space for entrepreneurial creativity and innovation but also for mentoring and networking.”

The FBE Lab is equipped with cutting-edge conference room technology, including electronic glass that instantly switches from clear to frosted, and will host mentorship meetings and events to develop student start-up ideas and family business projects. The space will also be utilized by Etown’s FBE Club – a network of students who come from family businesses of their own or who share a passion for entrepreneurship – to host events such as power lunches, idea pitch competitions, and an entrepreneurship scholarship competition. The High Center for Family Business will use the space to conduct its executive peer group meetings.

The initial concept of the FBE Lab began in 2018 as a joint effort between the School of Business and the High Center for Family Business. Construction on the space started in May 2024, and it was completed in time for students’ return to campus in the fall.

The Lab was made possible thanks to a generous gift from dedicated alumna Elizabeth “Bets” Keen ’77. Bets’ philanthropy also extends through her two scholarships – the Elizabeth A. Keen Entrepreneurship and Family Business Scholarship for students enrolled in the Family Business and Entrepreneurship Minor and the Elizabeth “Bets” Keen ’77 Business Scholarship for students pursuing studies in Business. Keen helped grow her family’s business, Keen Transport, into one of the nation’s largest heavy-haul trucking companies in the U.S. 

“Entrepreneurship and family businesses are hard,” Keen remarked at the Sept. 26 Dedication Ceremony. “They often fail because of one key missing factor, which is a business education. Etown gave me the confidence and education to interview my senior year with different corporations on campus and start my career.”

Keen worked with Sandu on the project and found his energy and his students’ energy inspiring. The lab was named in honor of Sandu and his work to create a vibrant FBE program at Etown for both undergraduate and graduate students.

The College has been a long-time advocate of family business and entrepreneurship through various educational offerings and support.

Since its founding in 1995, the S. Dale High Center for Family Business at Elizabethtown College has been dedicated to bringing the best available resources to families in businesses across south central Pennsylvania and beyond through Executive Peer Groups, Ownership Strategic Planning, and the Leadership Speaker Series. The High Center serves over 200 privately-held and family-owned businesses and has become a vital resource for Etown students. 

Etown’s Business program offers both an Entrepreneurship and Family Business minor and a concentration,  which develops the skills students need to lead and perform as a member of a family business and teaches them how to launch new ventures successfully. The Elizabethtown College School for Graduate and Professional Studies (SGPS) also launched a Family Business and Entrepreneurship graduate certificate in 2022 to foster students’ entrepreneurial spirit.

The FBE lab is the next step to fostering the entrepreneurial spirit that lives at Etown. Learn more about the School of Business at Etown.