Two years ago, the old and tired School of Management building, built in 1964, clearly needed everything. An addition with modern classrooms. Renovations to existing facilities. Space for student support. It was a need, and a hope, but not yet a plan.

Then, on Homecoming Weekend 1997, Eugene and Ronnie Isenberg's extraordinary generosity brought the School a giant step closer to creating this new reality. To maximize their gift, they also issued a challenge: They would give $4 million (out of a total $6 million gift) toward a new wing if their money were matched by $4 million from the state and another $4 million from UMass alumni and friends.

One such friend, in every sense of that word, is Harold Alfond, chairman and founder of the Dexter Shoe Company, long-time friend of the Isenbergs, new-found friend of the University of Massachusetts, and now a friend indeed to the newly named Isenberg School of Management. These interrelationships came together during the 1998 gala celebration honoring the Isenbergs.

"Gene and Ronnie had been talking to Harold for months about making a substantial gift," relates Thomas O'Brien, Dean of the Isenberg School. "So when Gene introduced me to Harold, I said, 'Gene's told me that if you donate $2 million, we'll name the addition after you.' So Harold laughed and replied that 'I thought it was only $1 million.' And I said, 'What a deal that would be. Half price.'"

This kind of philanthropic banter might seem like cheap enough talk, but a half-hour later Gene Isenberg informed Dean O'Brien that "Harold has decided to do it." He had decided to "do" $1 million, a splendid gift from the man Gene Isenberg credits with teaching him how to be a philanthropist. "In their philosophy of giving, both emphasize support for young people and challenge gifts," notes Gregory W. Powell, president of Dexter Enterprises. The gift is the latest in a long list of Alfond donations to many causes, mostly in his home state of Maine. Perhaps one of the main draws for his support of UMass at this time might have been as a lasting monument to his camaraderie with Gene Isenberg. "Linking the Isenberg School with the Alfond wing just seemed like a wonderful tribute to their friendship," says Dean O'Brien.

What a tribute it will be. When the Harold Alfond Management Center opens in 2002, it will feature four gleaming state-of-the-art classrooms, similar in their elaborate circuitry to Chemical Engineering's Alumni "Classroom of the Future," but configured here as case classrooms. They will be set up with the professor standing in a teaching well and with students grouped around so that classes can discuss case studies and be conducted through the Socratic Method. Each classroom is accompanied by one or more high-technology breakout rooms to facilitate student work in small teams.

The Alfond wing will also feature real-time trading rooms, high-tech audio-visual facilities, student services, a placement office, and an undergraduate advising office. As the technology improves, the distance-learning capabilities will help deliver a full range of business courses in the most effective way, similar to the UMass Video Instructional Program. The air-conditioned environment will also make it possible for the School to offer executive education programs during the summer and to expand other programs.

This modern, business-like higher education may not sound very much like the hands-on agricultural education and farming activity that characterized this campus when it was established in the 1860s, but in fact the spirit behind the Alfond Center is descended directly from our land-grant mission.

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