The University of Tulsa Board of Trustees has announced the appointment of Dr. Gerard Clancy as president designate. Clancy, 54, is currently TU’s vice president of health affairs and dean of the new Oxley College of Health Sciences. He will assume his duties as TU’s 20th president on Jan. 1, 2017, succeeding President Steadman Upham, who will retire at the end of this calendar year.
“The TU trustees are confident that we have made the right choice to position the university for the next generation,” said L. Duane Wilson (BS ’62), chairman of the TU Board of Trustees. “Gerry Clancy is a proven leader in higher education and a visionary for the Tulsa community who is committed to helping our students and alumni make a positive impact locally and globally.”
Before arriving at TU on Jan. 1, 2015, Clancy served as president of the University of Oklahoma-Tulsa for eight years.
Clancy joined OU in 2001 as dean of the College of Medicine in Tulsa, professor of psychiatry and Morningside Health Care Foundation Endowed Chair in Leadership. During his tenure as president, the OU-Tulsa Schusterman Center added more than $327 million in new facilities, academic degree programs, endowed faculty chairs and student scholarships. The campus also established educational and research partnerships with more than 100 community agencies.
Clancy helped develop a community health network that included after-hours free clinics for the underserved, pediatric school-based clinics in disadvantaged areas, mobile psychiatric teams and the OU Wayman Tisdale Specialty Health Clinic.
Through a $50 million donation from the George Kaiser Family Foundation, Clancy led the transformation of medical education at OU-Tulsa in 2008. In 2015 the College of Medicine’s Tulsa branch was renamed the OU – TU School of Community Medicine, a joint venture between the University of Oklahoma and The University of Tulsa to provide a four-year program of medical education in the City of Tulsa. Its mission is to improve the health of all Oklahomans, particularly those in underserved areas.
At TU, Clancy launched the College of Health Sciences in 2015 and announced the new name of the Oxley College last fall. The college is home to the TU School of Nursing; the faculties of Community Medicine; and the Departments of Athletic Training, Kinesiology & Rehabilitative Sciences and Communication Sciences & Disorders. The new college also is working closely with TU’s other colleges on interdisciplinary projects and with the Laureate Institute for Brain Research.
“I am tremendously excited about this next chapter and deeply appreciative of the support and confidence of the trustees, President Upham and my colleagues at TU,” Clancy said. “The University of Tulsa’s mission is closely aligned with my life’s work. Improving lives through scholarship and service is a noble cause, and TU has established itself as a national leader in academic community engagement.”
Clancy earned his bachelor’s and medical degrees from the University of Iowa, where he later served as a faculty member and vice chairman of the Department of Psychiatry. He is a graduate of the Harvard University Programs in Health Care Policy and Management and Non-Profit Financial Stewardship and served on active duty in the U.S. Air Force as a flight surgeon.
He and his wife, Paula, have three children Sam, 25, Mary, 22, and Joseph, 17.
“I’d like to thank the board for acting swiftly on this appointment,” Upham said. “Gerry is at home in Tulsa and at TU. The transition to his presidency will be seamless. He has shown an incredible ability to foster collaboration and inspire creative solutions. I look forward to watching the university’s continued progress.”
As a comprehensive, doctoral-degree-granting institution, The University of Tulsa provides undergraduate, graduate, and professional education of the highest quality in the arts, humanities, sciences, business, education, engineering, law, nursing, and applied health sciences. Current enrollment is 4,678 (3,478 undergraduate and 1,200 graduate and law students).
Under Upham, TU has achieved a remarkable transformation through strategic enhancements to its curriculum, student experience, research enterprise, community partnerships and physical campus. The university has raised more than $800 million in the past 12 years and is currently ranked No. 86 among all national universities by U.S. News and World Report.