Methodist University - Profile of the President

Profile of the President

Profile of M. Elton Hendricks, President of Methodist University

M. Elton Hendricks became the third president of Methodist University (then Methodist College) in 1983. He is the longest-seated president, now in his 20th year, at a private institution in North Carolina. He is also an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church.

Hendricks holds a Ph.D. in physics from the University of South Carolina, a Master’s of Divinity from Duke University and a bachelor’s, Phi Beta Kappa, in history from Wofford College. He is also a graduate of Harvard University’s Institute for Educational Management. He has published numerous articles on Methodism and physics.

Originally from Savannah, GA, Hendricks started his career in the U.S. Navy as a naval flight officer. After serving his country, he served a local congregation as a Methodist minister. He began his teaching career at Eisenhower College teaching physics and philosophy and religion.

He taught at his alma mater, Wofford College and served as both the school’s residence hall education program director and as director of Admissions. He went on to become the academic dean of Randolph-Macon College. After serving briefly as Randolph-Macon’s acting president, Hendricks came to Methodist University as president.

He is a member of the North Carolina Association of Independent Colleges and Universities Executive Committee, the Fayetteville Area Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors, the National Association of Schools and Colleges of the United Methodist Church, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, the Fayetteville Economic Development Corporation, the Arts Council of Fayetteville/Cumberland County, and is the current president of Cape Fear Industries. Hendricks also volunteers almost every summer with a mission team as a construction worker in rural Bolivia.

He and his wife, Jerry, have three grown children and four grandchildren. They reside on the Methodist University campus and are members of Hay Street United Methodist Church.

A Look Back Through a 20-Year Presidency

• Enrollment has more than doubled since 1983.
• Endowment has increased to about $8 million.
• Three strategic plans have been developed and implemented since 1989.
• Two capital campaigns have been successfully completed. The third is now underway.
• International student population has grown.
• Eleven new buildings, a soccer complex, a challenge course, an office park and a golf course have been built. Major renovations have been completed on residence halls, the science building and the cafeteria.
• Extensive landscaping has been installed. Phases I and II of campus irrigation have been completed. A new greenhouse now sits behind the Science Building.
• The College has added twenty-five degree programs and secured national accreditation for five of these programs.
• Faculty sabbaticals were implemented.
• Hourly employees were welcomed into the College’s benefits program.
• Residence halls have been networked with a computer port for every pillow.
• Football and women’s lacrosse have been added to our roster of NCAA teams.
• The writing of the history of Methodist University has been commissioned for the 50th Year Celebration in 2007.

President’s Vision Statement
Last fall, Dr. Hendricks wrote a vision statement for the future of Methodist University. You are invited to read it. If you would like a complete copy, please contact the .

Excerpt from Dr. M. Elton Hendricks’ Vision Statement, 2002

People inside and outside of the College frequently ask me about my vision, hopes, and dreams for Methodist University. I respond that I have had a generally constant vision of Methodist University for almost 20 years.

Methodist University has always had and continues to have a strong liberal arts core. Fifty-four of the 124 hours required for graduation are devoted to a traditional educational approach. At Methodist University, as on all campuses, the core is a political issue.

However, for a long period of time, we have had at Methodist University many majors that go beyond the traditional liberal arts. Our unusual approach of the deliberate union of a liberal arts core with career preparation has made for interesting debate. Everyone would agree that our approach has fueled our atypical growth as a college.

I had been a history major at a traditional liberal arts college and an academic dean at another very traditional liberal arts college. I was happy to arrive at Methodist University, which was not locked into the traditional, narrow mindset. Here I found more freedom, more flexibility, and, in my view, more wisdom.

Thus, from my beginning at Methodist University, I have envisioned and constantly lifted up a liberal arts core coupled with career preparation. Career preparation and technical education have never been, in my view, enemies of the liberal arts.

I believe our approach is an appropriate and even a necessary one in the contemporary recruiting environment. We have had a situation for many years in our country in which most students have been taught that the purpose of education is to prepare them to get a good job.

Thus, Methodist University was/is faced with three facts: (1) the Board’s charge to grow the College, (2) a tradition that appreciates the value of the liberating arts, and (3) the intense vocational/economic concerns of contemporary students. In light of these facts, I have encouraged Methodist University to combine a strong liberal arts core with career-oriented programs. Over many years now our college has been guided and enhanced by this vision.

There are additional career-oriented programs that our society needs and that our society will support, to which students will respond, and which Methodist University can do well. It is to the advantage of our college and to the benefit of our society to develop those new programs whereby we can “serve this present age.” Small colleges (or small universities) need to develop special and specialized niches. We need to continue the approach developed at Methodist University over 20 years by creating new additional career-oriented programs. I believe that Methodist University’s future growth (the obvious antidote to shrinking enrollment) lies in new professional undergraduate and graduate programs.

Some people see innovation and new program development as a threat to existing programs. Such thinking suggests the limitations of a zero-sum game outlook. If a new program grows, they think, my old program must shrink. On this view, there is a fixed-size pie: If one slice is larger, another slice must be smaller. But there is a better approach. Rather than divide differently a pie of the same size (a zero sum game), new programs can create a larger pie (this is the positive sum game) from which we all benefit. We need new programs, undergraduate and graduate, that can be profit centers— generating more resources than they consume. Such new, profitable programs will help to support those majors and faculty that we want and need as a part of our liberal arts tradition. The time may come, but has not yet arrived, when large numbers of students will seek out Methodist University because they want or realize they need the liberal arts majors that we love and that we do so well. In the meantime, if we lose our innovative spirit—our entrepreneurial verve—if we fail to identify and fill special professional and career-oriented niches, we place the future of Methodist University at serious risk. We are, at the present at Methodist University, in a position of relative strength, i.e. good enrollment. We dare not wait until we are in trouble to prepare for such a challenging future. If we wait until we feel the pain, it will be too late for anything but invasive surgery. This is the time for new program development.

I rather like Methodist University being labeled a small university, which is something we increasingly look like anyway. But I also like our liberal arts core, our noble tradition. I recognize that the majority of our recent graduates have been in areas that are career oriented. I am especially proud that these professional graduates have been in a small “university” that takes pride in and remains in touch with its liberal arts tradition. I think Plato had it right. I believe that Methodist University has it right.

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