In 2003, Exxon Mobil gave UT its historical archive of vintage gasoline pumps, stock certificates, signs and television commercials. The collection is worth $10 million. Now, ostensibly, UT has given Exxon Mobil its former president, Larry Faulkner.
Exxon Mobil announced the addition of Larry Faulkner to the company's board of directors Wednesday. Faulkner resigned from his presidency of the University in 2006. Also in recent Exxon Mobil news, the corporation reported a revenue of $114.89 billion in the fourth quarter of last year.
The only price that's increasing at the alarming rate of oil's is the price of higher education, lest we remind you that tuition has increased from $280 per semester in 1985 to more than $4,000 per semester today. Just as we cringe while filling our gas tanks, we feel the pinch even more when paying our tuition bills. But something's missing: If Big Oil is booming, and Big Oil helps keep our University more or less afloat (UT owes its existence in part to its 2.1 million acres of oil land in West Texas), why does our school keep knocking on our doors for more money?
Exxon has long been a major monetary donor to UT, and UT has provided Exxon with countless employees - including its current CEO, Rex Tillerson, a UT alum and member of UT's Engineering Foundation Advisory Council, and now Faulkner. One would think that, because of the interplay of officials with ties to both the University and the oil industry, there could be a dialogue between the two. But it seems these businesses, which have distinctly different mission statements, are not as different as we thought.
In 2006, Faulkner and Powers met with Tillerson and others to discuss Exxon's dedication to the National Math and Science Initiative, a Dallas-based nonprofit organization which hosts another former UT president, Peter Flawn, on its board of directors. The initiative, focused on strengthening America's stance as a technological innovator, was officially launched in March of last year with $125 million in funding from Exxon. Under the initiative, Exxon professed its investment in UTeach with a long-range plan to provide the state with more qualified math and science teachers. "The challenge to strengthen math and science education is huge," Tillerson stated at the 2006 conference, citing that less than 20 percent of high school seniors reached proficiency in math and science in 2005.
But it appears that even these seemingly holistic epistemological intentions are saturated with oil. Exxon and the NSMI's mission to fortify UTeach only makes the University closer to being a petroleum engineer factory than an academic haven for one and all. When major donors team up with powerful intellectual officials and put their time, energy and bank accounts into guaranteeing propagation of the industry that is the locus of our country's - and the world's - problems through University programs, what's in it for the majority of UT students who are of no foreseeable value to the oil industry?
Who's Who in the oil biz at UT
Robert B. Rowling UTIMCO Chair - Oversees Tana Exploration Company, which has been drilling exploratory wells in the Gulf of Mexico since 2002. - As of May 2006, had major stock holdings in Pacific Gas and Electric Company and Horizon Oil Limited.
Paul Foster UT regent, UTIMCO Policy Committee member and UTIMCO Audit and Ethics Committee member - President & CEO of Western Refining Company, the fourth-largest oil refining company in the nation. - Western Petroleum Marketers Association member - Western States Petroleum Association member - National Petroleum Refiners Association member - Arizona Petroleum Marketers Association member
H. Scott Caven, Jr. UT Board of Regents chair - Holds stock in Kinder Morgan Energy Partners, Kaneb Pipe Line Partners, Buckeye Partners, Magellan Midstream Partners, Energy Transfer Partners, Valero Energy Corporation, Enterprise Products Partners, Teppco Partners, Plains All American Pipeline, L.P., Northern Border Partners, Williams Partners and Tortoise Energy Capital Corp.
John Barnhill UT regent - Holds stock in ExxonMobil Corporation, Halliburton and Royal Dutch Pete Co.
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