Claire Schwan

Several goals are motivating the celebration. The UMUC Office of Institutional Advancement and the Mannheim Campus have partnered to contact 18,000 alumni around the world; to establish an alumni directory; and, finally, to construct a 50th Anniversary Courtyard.

One of the guests of honor at this year's celebration will be Claire Schwan, the school's very first student.

"She was more than just a student," said Mary Fiedler, resident dean of the Mannheim Campus. "It was she who went to her father, a commander, and said, 'I don't want to go back to the States to study. Do something.'"Schwan's father, Colonel William A. Swan, went to his superiors and convinced the U.S. Army to establish a school, and UMUC's Munich Campus was born. The school later moved to Augsburg and finally to Mannheim, where it stands today.

"We've changed locations and the students have changed their hairdos, but otherwise we're exactly the same," said Fiedler.

For more information about the Mannheim Campus, visit www.ed.umuc.edu/campus/mannheim/alumni, or, for information about UMUC's history worldwide, read UMUC's official history book, Never an Ivory Tower: University of Maryland University College—The First 50 Years. To purchase a copy of the book, go to www.umuc.edu/alum and click on "UMUC History," or call 301-985-7179.