Board of Trustees recognizes donors'
generosity at semiannual meeting

The University of Delaware Board of Trustees, at its semiannual meeting Dec. 18 in the Trabant University Center, handled a wide range of University business, acknowledging the generosity of donors to the Campaign for Delaware and approving the sale of a 255-acre site in Lewes for $3.1 million to the state of Delaware and its Open Space Council.

Proceeds from the sale of the land will be used to benefit the College of Marine Studies. Earlier this month, the Open Space Council agreed to the sale, which requires final approval from the secretary of the state's Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control.

The board also affirmed existing UD policy that allows credit card companies to make their services available to students who are interested, providing the companies follow established University guidelines.

The action was in response to a petition to ban on-campus credit card solicitation and releasing or selling student information to credit card companies. The University does not release or sell student information to credit card companies, President David P. Roselle said. UD does have an affinity card with MBNA, Roselle said, though it is used primarily by alumni and friends of UD.

Many students want the opportunity to obtain a credit card, Roselle said at an Oct. 24 meeting of the Trustee Committee on Student Life and Athletics, and UD makes that service available just as it does many other services for students.

Acknowledgements

During the meeting, the Board of Trustees recognized several benefactors and established funds in their honor.

Those recognized for their generosity included:

• the late Thomas A. Baker, a member of the UD's College of Agriculture and Natural Resources from 1919 to 1958, and his wife, Ruth E. Baker, in gratitude for their $200,000 bequest and service, establishing the T.A. Baker Professorship in Agriculture and Natural Resources.
  
  
• * the late Mrs. Helen E. Bancroft, for her bequest of $83,000, establishing the Helen E. Bancroft Scholarship fund, which will provide support for students in the College of Health and Nursing Sciences.
  
  
• the late Mrs. Anna Mae Borel, who died in 1988, leaving a trust for the benefit of her niece, Edith M. Talley, who died last year, resulting in a bequest of $1.275 million to the University's endowment.
  
  
• Lena Evans and her sister, Armitage Evans Reed, members of Delaware College's classes of 1887 and 1884, respectively, through a gift of $670,066 received by the University after the death of Mary P. Sullivan in 2000. In all, gifts of service and donations from the Evans family have totaled more than $1.4 million.
  
  
• Marvin Gilman, the late professor emeritus of urban affairs and public policy and a former member of UD's Board of Trustees, his wife, Muriel Edelstein Gilman, and their daughter Martha Gilman, a member of the Class of 1974, for their support leading to the creation of the Milton and Mary Edelstein Scholarship Fund for Public and Community Service in the College of Human Services, Education and Public Policy.
  
  
• The Aramark Corp., for its recent gift of $1 million to establish an endowed chair, to be known as the Aramark Chair in the Department of Hotel, Restaurant and Institutional Management.
  
  
• James H. Sills Jr., a former member of the faculty of the School of Urban Affairs and Public Policy and founding director of the Urban Agent Program, now known as the Center for Development and Family Policy, has been recognized for public service to the city of Wilmington and the state of Delaware and for his advocacy of a public and community service role for UD faculty and staff with the establishment of the James H. Sills Jr. Scholarship fund, funded by $250,000 from community leaders and corporations on his behalf.

IN RECOGNITION