The board of regents of Oral Roberts University (ORU) has voted to transfer the institution’s A.W. Coburn School of Law to CBN University (CBNU). The law school’s approximately 190,000 volumes are worth an estimated $10 million.
Students in the law school will finish the academic year at ORU in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Many of them are expected to move to Virginia Beach, Virginia, to begin classes at CBNU at the beginning of the 1986–87 school year.
ORU spokesman Rob Nordin said the university decided CBNU, which is exclusively a graduate university, is better equipped to provide a quality program in law. CBNU is seeking a transfer of the school’s provisional accreditation from the American Bar Association. Nordin said all ORU law professors have been invited to apply for teaching positions at CBNU.
This is the second major academic change made by ORU within the past year. Prior to the 1985–86 school year, ORU announced it would close its school of dentistry at the end of the academic year. The early announcement gave underclassmen the opportunity to transfer to other institutions. Nordin said ORU President Oral Roberts had raised money for the dental school by emphasizing the prospects it held for producing health-care missionaries. However, Nordin said, “there was disappointment that few graduates were willing to make that commitment.”
Financial problems in recent years have hampered the ministries that fall under the Oral Roberts umbrella. The problems are largely attributable to the City of Faith medical complex, which has lagged behind projections for breaking even financially (CT, Aug. 10, 1984, p. 46). Nordin said neither the transferring of the law school to CBNU nor the closing of the dental school was carried out for financial reasons. He acknowledged, however, “there is no question the university will recognize a financial savings from these two developments.”
