
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, October 8, 1995                   TAG: 9510090061
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-5   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: CHARLOTTESVILLE                                LENGTH: Short

UVA RAISES DONATION GOAL

University of Virginia officials have launched a major fund-raising drive, saying they are so confident about reaching the $700 million goal they are boosting it by $50 million.

The ``Campaign for Virginia'' is billed as the largest per-capita capital campaign in the history of public education. It is scheduled to run through June 2000.

``I've been encouraged for the last few weeks as the numbers mounted,'' the campaign's chairman, former university rector Joshua P. Darden, said after the new goal was announced Friday. `We've got such momentum, $750 million was realistic.''

University officials said that in two years they have secured about $350 million in the private phase of the campaign, compared with recent estimates of about $302 million.

At the kickoff ceremony, university President John Casteen said the school no longer can count on state funding to keep it in the ranks of the top schools in the country.

State funding for the university has dwindled during the past decade and is not expected to increase dramatically, he said.

- Associated Press

by CNB