Kettering University, which taught General Motors leaders such as CEO Mary Barra, is getting a $4 million gift from the carmaker to build a proving ground and powertrain test lab.
GM’s philanthropy arm plans to announce the donation Tuesday to the Flint, Mich., school, which the automaker once owned. The facilities, to be built in the next two to three years, will be used by students and professors researching topics such as electric cars and autonomous vehicles. The project is part of Kettering’s efforts to fight blight in Flint, which became an automotive powerhouse after GM was
founded there more than a century ago. The decline of the U.S. auto industry has devastated the city, where 41.5 percent of the population lives in poverty, according to U.S. Census data from 2009 to 2013.