Cunningham Resigns As Regent To Accept Baylor VP Position
HOUSTON -- Baylor University regent Harold R. Cunningham will step down from the institution's board in order to accept a position as Baylor's vice president for finance and administration. His resignation from the board, which is meeting this week in Houston, will be effective at the conclusion of its three-day meeting on Friday. He will assume the vice president's post on Monday.
Cunningham, who was elected to Baylor's board in 1996, has been serving on a voluntary basis as acting director of operations at the university since January 1997.
"Harold Cunningham has already been a tremendous help to me personally and to the university as a whole over these last 18 months," said Baylor President Robert B. Sloan Jr. "His considerable expertise in financial and operations management, combined with his love for Baylor, uniquely qualify him to lead this strategic area of the university. I am most grateful that he has accepted this responsibility."
Cunningham will be responsible for overseeing Baylor's finance, operations, physical plant, risk management, auxiliary services and information technology divisions.
"The past 18 months have been very interesting and exciting both from the regents' view and from the administrative view," Cunningham said. "We have a lot of projects under way and many more in the planning process. This is a time when I feel I can use my experience to help Baylor position itself for the future and achieve its potential as a top-notch Christian university. I look forward to working with Dr. Sloan and the administrative team to make this happen."
A 1956 business graduate of Baylor, Cunningham retired in 1996 from Arthur Andersen LLP after a 40-year career which included a three-year term as chief financial officer for Arthur Andersen Worldwide. He also served the company as head of its Houston audit division, managing partner-professional practice litigation, and senior partner.
Cunningham is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, the Texas and Houston CPA chapters, the Financial Executives Institute, and the International Management Association. He also serves as vice president of the Houston Arboretum and Nature Center and as a trustee of the Gulf Coast AgriBusiness Council.
He is a member of the Baylor Development Council and a life member of the Baylor Alumni Association. Cunningham served as president of the Houston Baylor Club and the Hankamer School of Business Advisory Council and was a member of the university's Sesquicentennial Council of 150. A recipient of Baylor's Old Main Award, he was awarded an Outstanding Alumnus Award in 1986 in the Omicron Delta Kappa Men and Women of Merit program.
Cunningham is a deacon at Houston's Tallowood Baptist Church, where he has been a member for 27 years. He and his wife, Ann, also a 1956 Baylor graduate, have two children, Chrisann Goad (B.S. Ed. '82), and Kevin, and six grandchildren.