3:14 p.m., Jan. 14, 2009----The inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th president of the United States will be televised from 10:30 a.m. to 4 p.m., Tuesday, Jan. 20, in the Multipurpose Rooms of the Trabant University Center.

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The event is presented by the University of Delaware Student Centers, and those who attend will be able to view all of the inaugural activities, from the swearing in through the parade. University employees who wish to attend should check with their supervisors.

The parade will feature the marching bands from both the University of Delaware, directed by Heidi Sarver, and Delaware State University. “Being chosen to perform in the 2009 Presidential Inaugural Parade is an honor beyond my wildest dreams,” Sarver said in December, upon learning the band had been selected. “One of my goals for the members of the University of Delaware Marching Band is to provide as many positive life changing experiences as I can; to provide them with opportunities they may never get the chance to experience that will make an impact upon their lives for years to come.”

Screens in the Trabant University Center will show news coverage provided by the CNN, MSNBC, ABC, CBS and NBC television networks.

There will be a raffle for Obama's book, The Audacity of Hope. There will also be free T-shirts, and plenty of refreshments and give-a-ways.

The University of Delaware was called the “epicenter” of the 2008 president race by the Bloomberg news service.

Bloomberg reporter Nicholas Johnston noted that the University of Delaware produced not just Democratic vice president-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr., a 1965 graduate with a double major in history and political science, but also the campaign managers for both Obama and Republican presidential candidate John McCain.

The McCain campaign was led by Steve Schmidt, who attended the University from 1988 to 1993 as a political science major, and the Obama campaign was guided by David Plouffe, who attended UD from fall 1985 through fall 1988, also as a political science major.

In addition, Biden is married to Jill Jacobs-Biden, also a UD graduate, earning a bachelor's degree in 1975 and her Ed.D. in 2006

Johnston wrote, “The academic epicenter of this year's presidential election isn't, as in some years past, Harvard or Yale. It's located between Baltimore and Philadelphia at the University of Delaware.”