in 2005, dr. jerry hayes and his wife, cris, funded the establishment of the hayes center for practice excellence at sco. with matching funds committed by sco’s board of trustees, an endowment was created to support the hayes center in its mission to serve the optometric profession as the premier resource for practice management education. one of the first of its kind, the center focuses on teaching independent optometrists how to manage the business side of their practice, strategic planning, budgeting, overhead control and increasing profitability.