President of Oral Roberts University
On January 28, 2009, the Board of Trustees of Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma, elected Rutland as the 3rd President of the institution. Rutland's selection came about after he was recommended by the university's presidential search committee to the Board of Trustees. The committee had been formed following the resignation of the school's former president, evangelist and son of the institution's namesake, Richard Roberts, in 2007. Roberts' resignation came on the heels of a financial scandal and a wrongful termination lawsuit filed by several former faculty members of the university, as well as numerous claims of misuse of funds and impropriety directed against his wife, Lindsay Roberts. Rutland's election marks the first time in the history of Oral Roberts University that a person not a member of the Roberts family will hold the office of president.
Rutland was selected from a pool of more than 130 applicants to lead the university and he assumed the office of the President on July 1, 2009, taking the reins of the institution from Interim President Dr. Ralph Fagin, who was appointed to the position following the resignation of Richard Roberts in 2007. Although Oral Roberts was not personally involved with the selection process, Rutland is reportedly the only person he seriously considered to take over the presidency of the university. Rutland initially told ORU he was not interested in the position, and would not even submit a resume, but was eventually persuaded to accept the post by ORU board chairman Mart Green. According to an Associated Press report, Rutland will be making a yearly salary of $275,000. Rutland has stated that his main goals as president will be to expand the university's enrollment, as well as work to restore trust between the university and the public with a "level of transparency, authenticity, and being straightforward as possible." In keeping with his goals for the university, Rutland decided to take on the responsibility for preaching at nearly all of the school's chapel services himself. It has been reported that Rutland hopes to be able to increase enrollment from its current level at just over 3,000 to as much as 6,500
Read more about this topic: Mark Rutland
Famous quotes containing the words president of, president, oral, roberts and/or university:
“The President of the United States ... should strive to be always mindful of the fact that he serves his party best who serves his country best.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)
“I shouldn’t want you to be surprised, or to draw any particular inference from my making speeches, or not making speeches, out there. I don’t recall any candidate for President that ever injured himself very much by not talking.”
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)
“My opposition [to interviews] lies in the fact that offhand answers have little value or grace of expression, and that such oral give and take helps to perpetuate the decline of the English language.”
—James Thurber (1894–1961)
“The great God endows His children variously. To some he gives intellect—and they move the earth. To some he allots heart—and the beating pulse of humanity is theirs. But to some He gives only a soul, without intelligence—and these, who never grow up, but remain always His children, are God’s fools, kindly, elemental, simple, as if from His palette the Artist of all had taken one color instead of many.”
—Mary Roberts Rinehart (1876–1958)
“It is well known, that the best productions of the best human intellects, are generally regarded by those intellects as mere immature freshman exercises, wholly worthless in themselves, except as initiatives for entering the great University of God after death.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)