UD recognized as Truman Foundation Honor Institution

Past Truman Scholarship winners Deborah Foster Cobb and David E. Kovara.

From left, Santiago Mendoza, his daughter, Virginia Mendoza, and Bangalore T. Lakshman. Ms. Mendoza is an undergraduate in the civil and environmental engineering and the 2004 recipient of the Bangalore T. Lakshman Civil and Environmental Engineering Scholarship. Lakshman, an alumnus of the College of Engineering who graduated with a master’s degree in 1971, also sponsors a second scholarship in the college, but that recipient, Sharon Huertas, was not present at the luncheon.

From left, Muriel Gilman and Meghan C. Weaver. A senior in the College of Health and Nursing Sciences, Weaver received the Muriel E. Gilman Scholarship, which is awarded each year to a graduate or undergraduate returning adult student majoring in nursing who demonstrates academic excellence and shows promise of success in the profession.

Standing, from left, T.W. Fraser Russell, his son, Brian Russell, and Mark Snyder, and seated, from left, Snyder’s parents, Keith and Elaine Snyder, and his girlfriend, Amy Holben. Snyder, a graduate student in chemical engineering, is the 2004 Fraser and Shirley Russell Teaching Fellow. Russell is Allan P. Colburn Professor of Chemical Engineering and vice provost for research at UD.

11:43 a.m., May 11, 2004--The University of Delaware has been recognized as a Truman Foundation Honor Institution, President David P. Roselle announced May 7 at the Honors Day luncheon in the Bob Carpenter Center.

The Truman Scholarship Foundation annually awards scholarships to college juniors with exceptional leadership potential who are committed to careers in government, the nonprofit or advocacy sectors, education or elsewhere in public service.

UD was one of only three institutions nationally to be designated a 2003 Truman Foundation Honor Institution, Roselle said. In all, only 49 institutions have been awarded this honor in the foundation’s 30-year history. Past recipients include Columbia, Duke, Georgetown, Harvard, Princeton and Yale universities.

Selection of UD as an Honor Institution was based on the University’s active encouragement of outstanding young people to pursue careers in public service, its sustained success in helping its students win Truman Scholarships and having a current Truman Scholar, Roselle said.

Since the foundation’s inception, UD has had 13 Truman Scholars, he said. Special guests at the luncheon were two past UD Truman Scholar recipients—Deborah Foster Cobb, AS ’93, and David Kovara, AS ’2002.

The Truman Scholarship Foundation was established by Congress in 1975 as the federal memorial to the 33rd president. Since the first awards were made in 1977, there have been 2,253 Truman Scholars elected.

Some 1,100 persons attended the May 7 luncheon, including students receiving awards at Honors Day, their parents, family members, friends, benefactors and colleagues.

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