Randall University

Randall University, formerly Hillsdale Free Will Baptist College, is a Christian liberal arts college in Moore, Oklahoma, offering several associate's and bachelor's degree programs and master's degree programs in ministry and a Masters of Public Administration (http://www.ru.edu/graduate-/master-of-public-administration/master-of-public-admin). It is one of several higher learning institutions associated with the Free Will Baptists. Randall University is a member of the Oklahoma Independent Colleges and University (OICU) which serves the common interests of private institutions of higher educationIn 2015 it had an enrollment of 365.HistoryFree Will Baptists envisioned an institution of Christian higher education in Oklahoma, even before statehood. The records of the Indian Territory Association of Free Will Baptists (1905) read: "We believe in encouraging a higher system of education among the Free Will Baptists." The merger of the northern movement of Free Will Baptists (known also as the Randall Movement, Free Baptists, or Anti-slavery Baptists) with the Northern Baptist Convention in 1911 left a scattered remnant of churches which did not participate in the merger, and those churches lost access to the historic Free Will Baptist schools, such as, Bates College in Maine and Hillsdale College in Michigan. However, the educational void was filled when the Co-operative General Association of Free Will Baptists in the west opened Tecumseh College in Tecumseh, Oklahoma in 1917. The first president was John H. Wolfe, a graduate of Hillsdale College in Michigan. The school was destroyed by fire in 1927 and was never completely rebuilt due to the depression, dust bowl days, World War II, and the Korean War.