The Next 50 Years

Across a thick-wooded area that spanned hundreds of acres, Oral Roberts walked, praying in the Spirit and envisioning a university with world-class academics and state-of-the-art technology, built on the Holy Spirit. Each day, Roberts surveyed the land and reflected on the words God had spoken to him:

“Raise up your students to hear My voice, to go where My light is dim, where My voice is heard small, and My healing power is not known, even to the uttermost bounds of the earth. Their work will exceed yours, and in this I am well pleased.”

“Build Me a University. Build it on My authority, and on the Holy Spirit.”

With the foundation of God’s promise and His Spirit, the first soil was turned, and Oral Roberts University became a reality. In the fall of 1965, the first students came to the university seeking a whole-person education.

The school year began with 300 students and 30 faculty members, and ORU had yet to be accredited.

“We were kind of like pioneers, but at that point I was ready to grow academically, as well as grow spiritually,” Betty Ford-Hembree, a member of ORU’s Alpha Class, said. “I felt a stirring in my spirit and felt like God was calling me in a new direction.”

First-Class University, State-of-the-Art Technology

From its beginnings, Chancellor Roberts set a high standard for the university.

“The president wanted academic excellence. It was the quality of the faculty that guaranteed the academic excellence that President Roberts demanded,” said former ORU provost Dr. Carl Hamilton. “And that excellence could then be seen in the students.”

Dr. William Jernigan was among those 30 first faculty members and recalls that standard applied to not only academics but every area of the campus.

“Oral Roberts believed we should not be second-class as an academic institution; we should be first-class,” Jernigan said. “The buildings and the equipment reflected that.”

Within a few short years, ORU had become a renowned education institution across the United States and the globe, with world-class academics and state-of-the-art technology.  In a Jan. 17, 1969 article, one newspaper described ORU as a “university that had teaching methods and equipment which are closer to the 21^st century than any other campus in the U.S.”

The Learning Resources Center contained a library that had the capacity for 500,000 volumes, and each classroom had all of the electronics a professor or student needed. Jernigan recalls the addition of the Dial Access Information Retrieval System (DAIRS), which gave students on-demand access to lectures and lesson plans. He describes it as one of the most modern academic access systems in the country at the time.

“A student could listen to the professor’s lecture 24 hours a day. The professor would record the lecture, and the students could dial in and get the lecture,” Jernigan said. “Some of the lectures were videoed, and you could dial in and watch video.”

Chancellor Roberts also laid the foundation for TV evangelism and Christian media. After visiting Burbank, California and seeing the studio where Johnny Carson filmed The Tonight Show, Roberts returned to Tulsa and built the Baby Mabee to house his TV studio (which was even larger than Carson’s). Roberts’ Sunday morning show became the number one religious TV show aired on Sundays for the next 30 years.

The architecture, infrastructure and technology on campus attracted visitors from all over the world, and ORU’s reputation extended around the globe. However, no matter how many buildings were erected or how many technological advances were made, the mission remained the same—educating the whole person, mind, body and spirit, to be sent into every person’s world.

“The rich legacy of ORU is its mission and vision, and its dedication to that mission,” ORU president Dr. William M. Wilson said. “Our founder never swayed from the word the Lord spoke to him—ORU’s foundation was God’s authority and the Holy Spirit.”

The Next 50 Years

Today, ORU has more than 40,000 alumni who have received that whole-person education, serving in 130 different countries. The 2014-15 school year drew 3,565 students from all 50 states and 84 countries. This year, ORU welcomed its 50^th freshman class and will celebrate its golden anniversary over the course of the next three years.

State-of-the-art facilities like the engineering department’s 3D Fabrication and Visualization Lab and the school of business’s ONEOK Executive Boardroom provide students with access to some of the latest technology.

“We started being first-class technologically, and over the years we have stayed up-to-date, and today, I think we are in the forefront, significantly impacting Christian higher education with online learning,” Jernigan said.

With one half of a century in the books, ORU is now focusing on its future.

“Fifty years from now higher education will be exceptionally different than it is today,” Wilson said. “Technology, mobility, opportunity and the increase of knowledge will all affect higher education dramatically. Some universities will not make it through these changes, but I am confident that ORU will not only survives but thrives.”

The 2065 student will look much different than the student of 2015, ORU provost Dr. Kathaleen Reid-Martinez predicts.

“The up-and-coming learner is going to expect education to be located with him or with her,” she said. “It’s no longer ‘just-in-time learning.’ It’s no longer ‘just-for-you learning.’ It’s ‘just-with-you learning’—it’s following you and pushing you toward what you need to learn next and why you need to learn it.”

In the next decade, ORU is looking to expand access to whole-person education to students on every inhabited continent through globalization. Technology will play a major part in that, Reid-Martinez said.

“Technology is absolutely essential for a 21^st century university,” Reid-Martinez said. “The technology is a major part of that thrust, especially as we go global, because that is how we are going to be able to harness together the learning from around the globe of professors and students, no matter where they are located.”

Wilson is passionate to make ORU the premier Christian university for Spirit-empowered students worldwide. He believes that the university is on strong footing as it leaps into the next 50 years.

“There are a lot of good colleges. We are an exceptional college with a great future. We have world-class academics, a unique focus on physical fitness, an amazing student body and faculty—all fused together in a vibrant spiritual environment. I am certain that we will be the top choice for Spirit-empowered Christians seeking a higher education.”

A world-class university built on the Holy Spirit, with state-of-the-art technology, distinguished academics and facilities superior to those of any other institution in the world, sending Spirit-empowered leaders into the world—that is the reputation of ORU. In the next 50 years, that legacy will continue.

To the Uttermost Bounds of the Earth

“Moving into our 50 year anniversary, we want to set ourselves up to fully become the university that God intended us to be from the beginning, the university that Oral envisioned 50 years ago, so that our greatest days are ahead of us in the 21^st century,” said Board of Trustees chair Rob Hoskins.

As ORU journeys forward into the next half of a century, the 50^th Anniversary Comprehensive Campaign, “To the Uttermost Bounds of the Earth,” has been launched. The campaign calls for $50 million to be raised over the next three years to impact academic growth and expansion, with an additional $20 million in deferred giving. The campaign will fund four major areas:

– Globalization of Whole-Person Education

– Enhanced Physical Campus

– Quest Whole Person Scholarships

– Strengthened University Endowment

This campaign is set to position ORU to emerge into its next 50 years stronger and better than ever before, addressing the needs and demands of a multicultural, multidimensional, global university, Wilson said.

“We’ve been in a season for the past couple of years where we have been dreaming,” Wilson said. “As we dream, of course, we need resources to do what God is putting in our hearts. This $50 million campaign will help us start moving forward with the global strategy God has given us for the future.”

The 50^th anniversary campaign provides opportunities for globalization, online and distance learning and campus improvements. The funds raised will also assist ongoing growth and continued financial stability of the university.

“It will let us fulfill that next stage of growth, but more than just ORU, it will allow us to meet our learners around the globe to the glory of Jesus Christ,” Reid-Martinez said.

The next 50 years lie ahead for students, alumni, faculty and staff. What the founder envisioned years ago is today’s reality, which Laura Bishop, ORU’s vice president of Development and Alumni Relations, said is exciting to her as an alumnus.

“I find it incredibly exciting to be dreaming, planning and preparing for the future of this great university. I believe in this so strongly that I left a job I loved in Fort Lauderdale and my family, and I moved to Tulsa to commit my services to help with the success of this special campaign. As we embark on our half century mark, I’m honored to share the word with our alumni and friends that the time is now to support ORU, ‘for such a time as this.’”

The Future of ORU

“I felt like I was called to this university,” said graphic design major Jake Haynes. “There was a dream I had, and God was calling me here because that was how I was going to fulfill that dream.”

Just as in 1965, students are being drawn to ORU because they desire to receive an excellent education in a positive, spiritual environment.

“What we started in 1965 has not stopped; we are developing it in a greater way,” Jernigan said. “Oral’s vision was to have a first-class university. I think today we have a first-class university not only because of the academics, but also because we have followed the leadership of the Holy Spirit.”

Each year, thousands of Spirit-empowered leaders are sent into the uttermost bounds of the earth where they are impacting the Kingdom of God.

“We have an opportunity to carry forth (Chancellor Roberts’) vision in a greater way today than even when he was alive,” Jernigan said. “I think today the students that we have and the 40,000 alumni are doing more than he could have done.”

Through the anniversary campaign, ORU is honoring the past—our founder’s vision and the foundation of ORU—while looking to what God has on the horizon.

“The story of ORU is bigger than all of us,” Wilson said. “This is a God thing. God is at work He cares about this next generation. He cares about the Spirit-empowered movement around the world, and He wants us to provide global leaders within that movement. It is exciting to be a part of something that is bigger than all of us.”

To learn more about the campaign, visit oru.edu/50/campaign or call the development office at 918-495-7336.