Wake Forest Law receives $5M from Kern family to expand character-based legal leadership model

Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, has announced a $5 million award from the Kern Family Foundation in support of the WFU School of Law. The funds will expand character-based leadership in legal education, scaling curriculum development, student cohorts, and faculty training that embed professional identity formation into legal training. The award will also help build a national network of law schools focused on ethics-driven leadership. The initiative aims to strengthen lawyer preparation amid evolving bar standards, AI disruption, and declining public trust in the profession.