8:00 a.m., April 1, 2003--A spring series of panel discussions on key topics in corporate governance is being planned by the University of Delaware’s Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics.

The discussions are part of a finance course offered by Charles Elson, Woolard Professor and director of the John L. Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance, and will feature nationally recognized experts on a variety of issues.

Sessions will meet from 9:30-10:45 a.m., Thursdays, beginning April 10 and concluding May 8, in 125 MBNA America Hall. Members of the campus community and the public are invited to attend, and if interested should call the Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance at (302) 831-6157.

The opening panel on April 10 will look at audit committee reform and financial misconduct. Panelists will be James Cheek of Bass, Berry & Sims, PLC; Marshall Day, former chief financial officer of Home Depot; Kayla Gillan, member of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board;
Jack Jacobs, vice chancellor in the Delaware Court of Chancery; Frank Menaker, senior vice president and general counsel of Lockheed Martin;
Lynn Turner, professor at Colorado State University; and Jonathan Weil, a staff writer for the Wall Street Journal

On April 17, the panel will discuss corporate governance guidelines. Panelists will be Stephen Bainbridge, law professor at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA); Randy Holland, a justice on the Delaware Supreme Court; Andrew Metrick, assistant professor of finance at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania; Steve Odland, chairman, president and CEO of Autozone Inc.; Ed Shaw, general counsel for Aetna; Mike Useem, William and Jacalyn Egan Professor at the Wharton School; and Ted White, director of corporate governance for the California Public Employees Retirement System (CALPERS).

The panel April 24 will consider corporate law and the impact of increasing federalism on Delaware’s corporate franchise. The state has long been a haven for incorporation and has developed a unique and important place in corporate law both nationally and internationally. Panelists will be Lucien Bebchuk, William J. Friedman and Alicia Townsend Friedman Professor at Harvard Law School; Jack Coffee, Adolf A. Berle Professor at Columbia Law School; Ed Labaton, partner, Goodkind Labaton Rudoff & Sucharow LLP; Simon Lorne, partner, Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP; and E. Norman Veasey, chief justice of the Delaware Supreme Court.

The final panel May 8 will consider the role of the dissident director. Panelists will be Peter Burrows, staff writer for Business Week; William Chandler, chancellor in the Delaware Court of Chancery; Bert Denton, president of Providence Capital Inc.; Joseph Grundfest, professor at Stanford Law School; Sam Heyman, chairman of the board for International Specialty Products; Robert Lamm, corporate secretary for Computer Associates; and Guhan Subramanian, Joseph Flom Assistant Professor at Harvard Law School.