Sun, Nov 08 2009
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Published July 01, 2009 11:39 pm - TULSA, Okla. — Workers are toiling in the thick summer heat, trying to bring the campus of Oral Roberts University into the current century. Parking lots are torn up on the 1960s-era grounds, dormitory walls have been stripped to the studs and crates of new stainless-steel appliances wait to be put in the cafeteria. Oklahoma: Family tradition ends as Oral Roberts U. revamps The Associated Press
TULSA, Okla. — Workers are toiling in the thick summer heat, trying to bring the campus of Oral Roberts University into the current century. Parking lots are torn up on the 1960s-era grounds, dormitory walls have been stripped to the studs and crates of new stainless-steel appliances wait to be put in the cafeteria. Two years ago, this kind of large-scale remodel — about $20.5 million worth — would have been impossible because the evangelical school was mired in debt. Morale was circling the drain, too, as then-school president Richard Roberts was accused of spending university money on vacations, home remodels and other luxuries. Roberts, the son of the school’s namesake founder, eventually resigned but denied any wrongdoing. Today, the once-tarnished university known for its 60-foot-high bronze sculpture of praying hands is emerging from the 2007 scandal with a new campus, hundreds of new donors, tens of millions of dollars in paid-off debt — and a new president. Mark Rutland, 61, takes office Wednesday and becomes the first person to lead the school without the surname of Roberts. He’ll make $275,000 a year. He faces several challenges, including reversing sluggish enrollment and deciding whether to sell a handful of key university properties to shore up finances. The university already laid off 53 employees in January to make ends meet, and has been looking at other ways to save money. But Rutland’s hardest task could come in restoring the ORU brand, hoping to make it among the schools recognized by a mere acronym, such as the nearby University of Oklahoma, or even a school color, like at the University of Tennessee. “Look, if you see OU, you know what that means, if you see ND, you know it means Notre Dame,” Rutland said in a recent interview in his office overlooking the campus. “If you see a big, orange T, you know what it means. “It finds its own identity, where just the letters make the statement,” he says. The school already has made significant progress. It has whittled its debt from $55 million at the height of the scandal to around $720,000, thanks to a matching gift campaign that brought in more than $22 million. Once-disgruntled alumni — of which only 6 percent had donated to the school two years ago — are being courted. The number of new donors rocketed more than 145 percent between 2008 and 2009, from 361 to 887, and donations spiked from $763,000 in 2007 to $2.3 million this year. “It’s the highest year of alumni giving in the history of the school,” Rutland said. “And I don’t think we’re at the end of it, I think we’re at the beginning of it.” 
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