Paul L. Foster Campus for Business and Innovation Builds on Tradition of Excellence

Boldly envisioned and faithfully pursued, the Paul L. Foster Campus for Business and Innovation builds upon the tradition of excellence that is the hallmark of the nationally ranked Hankamer School of Business. The state-of-the-art campus positions the school to provide collaborative learning experiences for generations to come.

The Hankamer School of Business is consistently ranked among the nation’s top schools and offers 24 undergraduate and 13 graduate areas of study. It is one of just 5 percent of business schools worldwide with international accreditation from the American Association of Collegiate Schools of Business, a designation achieved in 1959.

An historic gift in June 2013 from El Paso businessman and civic leader Paul L. Foster, BBA ’79, chairman of the board and executive chairman of Western Refining Inc., cleared the path for construction, and on Sept. 25, 2015 University leaders, donors, faculty, staff, students and guests joined together to dedicate the facility. An appreciative, standing room only crowd filled the facility’s Meyer Conference Center.

The celebration continued throughout the day with the 2015 Leadership and Innovation Summit, as the leading voices in technology, energy and healthcare participated in three Q&A forums that addressed the challenges and opportunities faced by their industries.

The technology forum, facilitated by Rick Welday, president of AT&T AdWorks, featured industry experts Godfrey Sullivan, president, CEO and chairman of Splunk, Trent Voigt, founder and chief executive officer of JetPay Payment Services and Bob Beauchamp, chairman and CEO of BMC Software and Baylor University Regent.

Ray Perryman, president and CEO of the Perryman Group, moderated the energy forum with industry leaders Paul L. Foster, Baylor Regent Mark McCollum, executive vice president and chief integration officer of Halliburton and Bob Simpson, co-founder of XTO.

Healthcare panelists Jon Foster, president of American Group HCA, Laura Irvine, executive vice president of the Methodist Health System and Baylor Regent Joel Allison, CEO of Baylor Scott & White Health participated in a discussion moderated by Ed Trevathan, executive vice president and provost of Baylor University.

The celebration was capped off with a special evening event — a conversation between Baylor President and Chancellor Ken Starr and Jeffrey Immelt, chairman and CEO of General Electric.

Video recordings of the dedication and each of the Summit events are available at baylor.edu/fostercampus.