UD officials face questions on school's public-private status

DOVER — The debate over whether the University of Delaware is public or private continues to simmer.

Less than a month after being bombarded with concerns about transparency and other issues, President Dennis Assanis faced more fierce questioning from lawmakers Tuesday. Appearing before a legislative budget committee for the second time in four weeks, top UD officials were forced to defend the university’s status as a quasi-public institution.

UD’s website calls it a “state-assisted yet privately governed” school, which the institution says has its roots in the institution’s charter. That term does not appear in the founding document itself, however, although it does say the state, in 1913, granted “to the University of Delaware a perpetual charter which contains no reserve power in the General Assembly to amend the charter thus granted.”

Pressed by lawmakers on the Joint Committee on Capital Improvement Tuesday, UD administrators cited that “perpetual” charter, arguing final authority for governance rests with the university’s board of trustees.

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