University of Delaware
Office of Public Relations
UpDate - Vol. 16, No. 33, May 29

            MBNA provides building for UD classes downtown
     
     The University of Delaware will open a new classroom
building in downtown Wilmington, and plans are for
continuing education and professional development classes to
be offered there beginning in the fall of 1998.
     At its regular semiannual meeting May 27, UD's Board of
Trustees approved the opening of the new center.
     "This new facility provides a unique opportunity for
the University to bring its best programs to a new
audience-those who live and work in and around Wilmington,
many of whom are UD graduates," President David P. Roselle
said. "It's exciting to be able to bring UD courses into the
heart of the city, and I am looking forward to the
opportunities this project will bring."
     To assist with the new facility, MBNA America has
offered to make available three buildings to UD, including
the former Bank of Delaware Building at the corner of Eighth
and King streets, as well as two rowhouses facing Eighth
Street.
     In addition, MBNA has offered up to $2.5 million to
cover renovation and construction costs and will assist with
enrollment.
     The end result of the renovation/construction project,
expected to begin this summer, will be a unified structure
of approximately 14,000 gross square feet that will provide
about 10 classrooms, a reception lobby/lounge and several
offices.
     This will be the fourth UD facility in the city,
joining the Wilmington Campus on Pennsylvania Avenue, which
includes the Goodstay Center and Gardens, Arsht Hall (home
of the Academy of Lifelong Learning) and the Wilcastle
Center; the Small Business Resource and Information Center
at 1318 North Market St.; and the Community Development
Resource Center in the Community Services Building at 10th
and Shipley streets.
     "MBNA America has, in a very short time, built an
extraordinary tradition of support to the University of
Delaware, as part of its exemplary program of charitable
support and caring for the general Delaware community,"
Roselle said.
     "The University is very grateful for this continuing
and most generous support from one of Delaware's most
outstanding corporate citizens," he said.
     "We appreciate what the University of Delaware does for
MBNA and for the state of Delaware," MBNA Chairman and CEO
Charlie Cawley said. "To be successful in business today you
have to be good at what you do, and the students and alumni
from the University who join us at MBNA come well prepared
in every important way.
     "It is a pleasure to help make this quality of higher
education available to the citizens who live and work in
Wilmington, enabling them to more conveniently enhance their
abilities and keep current in professional fields," Cawley
said.
     Past MBNA gifts to the University of Delaware have
included
     * $2.5 million to support the new MBNA America Hall and
      the renovation of existing facilities for the College
      of Business and Economics on the Newark campus
      (scheduled to be completed this summer);
     * $1 million to support the Fortune 2000 Program, a
      minority recruitment and scholarship program in the
      College of Business and Economics;
     * $200,000 to establish the MBNA America Business
      Professorship; and
     * $325,000 to fund the MBNA Concourse in the Bob
      Carpenter Sports/Convocation Center.
     More than 1,600 MBNA people are either University of
Delaware graduates or are attending the University. UD also
conducts an on-site MBA program at MBNA's Newark location.