Professor Schrock was born in Berne, Indiana, and went to Mission Bay High School in San Diego, California. He was given a B.A. degree in 1967 from the University of California, Riverside and a Ph.D., in 1971, from Harvard University. At Harvard he was a student of J. A. Osborn. Between 1971 and 1972, he studied at the University of Cambridge with Lord Jack Lewis. In 1972, he began working for George Parshall in the Experimental Station of the E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company in Wilmington, Delaware. He joined the faculty of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1975 and became a professor in 1980.