A new campaign was recently launched to help better the future of Baker University.

The Forever Orange campaign is comprehensive and meant to take place over the next five years, with an end goal of raising $20 million.

“It’s not a specific campaign to one building or one program or raising money for one thing in particular,” Annual Fund Officer Rachel Shuck said. “It’s really broad in a sense to build up the university overall. That was really important to us and Dr. Murray. We didn’t want it to be one thing, in particular, we wanted to strengthen lots of different areas around the university.”

Although the campaign launched publically in April, it has been in the works since May 2016.

“It was a vision that Dr. Murray and our Board of Trustees had. For Dr. Murray it was really important to her to really have this comprehensive campaign,” Shuck said. “We’ve been in the silent phase for almost two years, during that time the University Development staff has been meeting with donors and securing gifts.”

Shuck has worked on many different aspects of the campaign including writing different pieces and working with the marketing team to develop the campaign website.

Many Alumni are involved in the campaign. The campaign co-chairs include Murray Blackwelder, Diane Wilson Blackwelder, Gary Sollars and Connie Mangun Sollars. There is also a committee involved with the campaign.

“We’re very thankful for the committee of alumni that are working with us, we are really thankful for them and their leadership and support,” Shuck said. “They really are the ones out there meeting with other alums.”

In celebration of the campaign, there will be an event on Oct. 13 at a gallery in Kansas City. The event is meant to kick-off the start of the campaign.

To check the progress of the campaign you can visit https://www.bakeru.edu/foreverorange/

“We hope that this is something everyone in the baker community can get behind. There’s lots of different ways to contribute, even for our students. There’s lots of ways to get involved, every gift helps, whether it’s $20 or $20,000,” Shuck said.