VISION for MOMENTUM

Outgoing Texas Wesleyan President Frederick G. Slabach led the university through some of its greatest accomplishments and toughest challenges for more than a decade. How did he do it? By sharing the spotlight with the university’s community.

Texas Wesleyan has come a long way in a decade. Its football team – which was still on its 75-yearlong hiatus in 2013 – is making itself known as a serious competitor with a co-conference championship win less than five years after the program began. It’s hard not to look at the new buildings on campus and not think of the word transformation. Programs, like the university’s online MBA, are thriving.

Texas Wesleyan’s legendary President Law Sone famously tossed the keys of the university to the creditors during the Great Depression and dared them to foreclose on the struggling institution –they balked and Sone led the university through many of its biggest accomplishments. He would leave the university in perhaps its strongest position to date, save for maybe its current position.

President Frederick G. Slabach – who is leaving his post after 12 years to accept a new charge as dean of the University of Mississippi School of Law – skipped Sone’s dramatic flair, but he made a compelling case to the philanthropic community across Dallas-Fort Worth and Texas in a way that radically reshaped the campus footprint and helped grow student and academic life on campus. The university’s score on one federal higher education financial scorecard was 0.6 in 2011. It stayed at 3.0 – the maximum score – for years – thanks to the focused approach Slabach and his executive staff took toward the university’s finances, which were historically prone to market fluctuations. Instead, they focused on building programs based on community needs.

Leadership gifts from large donors like Karen Cramer HON ’22 and Nick and Lou Martin HON ’03 showed confidence in the university’s stability, and Fort Worth’s philanthropic community took a second look at the institution. The university raised $15 million, its best, in 2021.

The centerpiece of those efforts is known as the Rosedale Renaissance, a $6.7-million, four-part project that created a new front door for the campus at the Canafax Clock Tower. Across the street on East Rosedale, the UMC Central Texas Conference Service Center brought new jobs to the community and deepened the school’s relationship with the United Methodist Church. Behind it, the renovated Polytechnic Firehouse houses the Bernice Coulter Templeton Art Studio. Governmental organizations made more than $32 million in street improvements in addition to Texas Wesleyan’s own $1.8 million investment – a vision made real.

One investment built on another: With an open front door the university embarked on its $20.25 million “Heart of Campus” campaign that built the 44,000-square-foot Martin University Center, the new nexus of activity for Texas Wesleyan’s growing student life programs. More than $50 million went into campus investments during Slabach’s term. in October 2016, President Slabach delivered an address called “The Relevance of Our Mission” that would echo far beyond that academic year and into the turbulent years that lay ahead.

Another key catalyst for that renewed energy was the reintroduction of football in 2017.

That move brought more than 100 new students to campus in the form of players, but it also launched a band and reformed dance and cheer teams that wove a complex tapestry of student life together in new ways. The university launched a successful esports program not long after that appealed to the modern Texas Wesleyan student.

The university plans to launch a $16.5 million investment in a stadium that will connect the dots between Texas Wesleyan’s buzzing student life and the community that has supported its rise. That means new lights and a track that will serve its community as well as the university’s teams.

“Shall we despair? Shall we lose hope? Shall we allow people who seek to divide us by religion and ethnicity go unchallenged? Or shall we engage in efforts to create and foster opportunities for positive knowledge and engagement. In spite of all the history and in spite of all the current fearmongering, I have hope.”

That vision was articulated from Slabach’s earliest days as president, as early as his inauguration in 2012.

Academic Convocation kicks off the academic year at Texas Wesleyan and is full of the sort of pomp and circumstance that can be found only in higher education. It’s the event where faculty assemble and receive the charge to guide and educate students. But

“Fred Slabach has a clear vision for this university’s future based on what is best for students, including relatively small classes, a regular dialogue between undergraduates and faculty, a commitment to lifelong learning, and an emphasis on critical thinking,” Madeleine Albright, former secretary of state and keynote speaker, said. “This emphasis is needed because you don’t have to be an expert in foreign policy to know that our globe has suffered a great deal in the past, from wishful and simplistic thinkers, not to mention those who fail to think at all.”

But that hope and vision would be tested and stretched thin at times in the following years – the 2020 pandemic raged alongside social unrest even as the California nonprofit Educate to Career named Texas Wesleyan one of the best universities for its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic – thanks to a pre-pandemic effort to develop virtual learning policies and processes.

New undergraduate and graduate programs – including the popular online MBA – expanded the university’s reach deeper into online education in a way that also directly impacted its community. Its online MBA students, for instance, usually reside within 90 miles of the institution. The university also continued to grow its health professions programs, including expanding its already-strong presence in nurse anesthesia.

2011

Former Texas Wesleyan Law School

Dean and Harry Truman Scholarship CEO Frederick G. Slabach is selected as Texas Wesleyan’s president.

2012

January – Frederick G. Slabach is inaugurated as the 20 th president of Texas Wesleyan. The celebration features a keynote address by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.

2013

August – Texas Wesleyan and Texas A&M University agree to terms for the Texas Wesleyan School of Law to become the Texas A&M School of Law.

September – Texas Wesleyan’s new “Smaller. Smarter.” brand debuts across the Dallas-Fort Worth area in the form of billboards, t-shirts and commercials.

2014

May – The School of Business Administration announces it has received AACSB accreditation, something earned by less than 5% of the world’s business schools. Also in May, the Smaller. Smarter. Promise Scholarship takes off. The scholarship offers free tuition to qualifying transfer students.

2015

February – The university’s “Smaller. Smarter.” ad campaign wins big at the Fort Worth Addy awards. The TV commercials, made in tandem with Firehouse agency, win two gold awards and one silver award at the event.

2016

February – Texas Wesleyan celebrates 125 years with a year of events culminating in a star-studded annual gala to celebrate the university past, present and future.

Octobe r – President Slabach delivers “The Relevance of Our Mission” speech at Academic Convocation.

2017

Texas Wesleyan’s football team – announced in 2016 – kicks off their first season and is featured in the popular web series “Titletown, TX.”

Texas Wesleyan’s online MBA degree debuts to a strong start. The program can be finished in as little as a year and is 100% online.

2018

Texas Wesleyan launches its Esports & Gaming program. The forward-thinking group kicks off a new interest in technology and STEM among students on campus.

Graduate programs were especially important to Slabach’s vision for critical thinking and analytical reasoning. A first-generation college graduate himself and the child of hardworking Mississippi parents, he often said that his father’s generation needed a high school diploma, his generation needed a college degree, and the next will require a graduate degree or professional certification. The driving force behind these efforts was a vision for Texas Wesleyan as a hub for critical thinking and analytical reasoning in Fort Worth. That human-centered approach is evident in many ways – including a panel on the Ukraine conflict led by Christopher Ohan, associate professor of history, and Michelle Payne, associate professor of political science, in Spring 2022 that Slabach participated in as a guest.

Tragedy often hit much too close to home, including the 2019 killing of Atatiana Jefferson just 2 miles from campus, an event still felt in the southeast Fort Worth community –and across the nation. The George Floyd protests during summer 2020 began new conversations about equity and inclusion among Texas Wesleyan’s diverse campus community.

The university is designated as both a Hispanic-serving institution and a minority-serving institution. As these discussions continue to deepen, they bring students – and communities –closer together in a place where they can feel safe to ask difficult questions – and expect real answers.

Flashback to 2013

When President Frederick G. Slabach and Texas A&M System Chancellor John Sharp announced in a joint press conference the strategic partnership preceding the purchase of the Texas Wesleyan University School of Law (it would be renamed Texas A&M University School of Law). “The transaction we celebrate today is a win-win-win scenario for Texas A&M University, the City of Fort Worth and Texas Wesleyan University,” Slabach said.

For Texas Wesleyan the wins were immediate. The university received $73.2 million over a five-year period that included both the law school and the downtown real estate. The infusion allowed Texas Wesleyan to revitalize its operations and refocus its vision on its home neighborhood in southeast Fort Worth. It also allowed the university to establish its niche in the Dallas-Fort Worth education community – educating students that stay in their communities to thrive and lead at home, at work and beyond –with its “Smaller. Smarter.” campaign.

Those wins are even more evident a decade later, as Fort Worth looks to define its future in the 21st century.

Looking back brings one of Slabach’s favorite quotes, attributed to Harry S. Truman, into sharp focus –“It’s amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.”

“President Fred Slabach has been an incredible leader not only for Texas Wesleyan University but for all of Fort Worth,” said Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker. “Under his leadership, Slabach led the economic revitalization of the campus and the Rosedale Renaissance in east Fort Worth. His tenure as president is both impressive and transformative for the university, and we are indebted to his leadership. David and I wish Fred and his wife, Melany, all the best in their return to Mississippi. He left TXWES and Fort Worth better than he found them and, for that, I am incredibly grateful.”

There is one word that stands out in there – transformative

2019

President Slabach wins the prestigious CASE District IV Leadership award. It is the highest honor bestowed by the organization, recognizing an outstanding leader in the district, which includes Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas.

2020

2021

The Martin University Center opens in the heart of campus. It serves as a capstone on the wildly successful Rosedale Renaissance project that defined much of the university’s decade.

COVID-19 rocks the world – and Texas Wesleyan’s campus is not immune to the deadly virus. Its safety-first strategy earns the university recognition for its response from Educate to Career, a California-based education nonprofit.

The university announces it is fundraising to build a new multipurpose football stadium. Longtime trustee and friend Karen Cramer HON ’22 pledges a leadership gift of more than $5 million to the project.

Sharing the Vision

President Slabach valued student life and even received a firsthand look at it when he lived in a residence hall on campus during his earliest days as president. A gifted orator, he was an early adopter of video as a tool to increase communication across campus.

That started with the 2020 Vision video series that included increased administrative transparency with town halls that increased input and addressed issues, concerns and rumors on campus. He also “popped in” on faculty members to recognize them for their hard work in the “Faculty PopIns with Fred” series.

That transparency extended to increase communication about financial aid and scholarships through multiple video series, increased partnerships across the local and higher ed communities, a term as Independent Colleges and Universities of Texas (ICUT) chair, new articulation agreements with Tarrant County College, a scholarship partnership with the Ben Hogan Foundation, and a marquee social event with the Business Hall of Fame.

The result of all this momentum was a campus community that got moving. That included bringing the health focused BlueZones program to campus, rolling town halls with the mayor, and a new and renewed sense of optimism about the future of Texas Wesleyan. Slabach promoted good things that brought the Texas Wesleyan community together.

The biggest vehicle for that message was the university’s award-winning brand campaign “Smaller. Smarter.”

The decade long advertising campaign demystified higher ed and attracted a type of student all its own – bright, community-focused, and ready to get to work on those goals right away.

Fall 2022 enrollment was 2,653 –the largest in a decade.

Slabach led the campus community through many new and major firsts. A new front door that physically reoriented campus. A new era of athletics and student life. A new, $20.25 million, 44,000-square-foot student center. A platform for growth in the ENGAGE 2025 plan.

That last one is very important – ENGAGE 2025 is rooted in the values and vision of the university as a place where motivated students can get ready for leadership in professional careers and their communities – work that connects the entire education community together.

In an email to the campus community, Slabach expressed pride in the work of the faculty and staff in fulfilling the university’s mission in higher education, writing that “the work we are doing together here at Texas Wesleyan has been the pinnacle of my professional life. I am grateful to be a part of this community and its continued momentum. Because of you, the university’s future is bright.”

2022

President Slabach awards the inaugural Diversity & Inclusion award to Angela Dampeer, associate vice president of human resources. The award highlights the university’s commitment to civic responsibility.

2023

President Slabach announces his departure as he leaves to become dean at the University of Mississippi School of Law.