McMurry University is a private Methodist university in Abilene, Texas. It was founded in 1923 and named after William Fletcher McMurry. The university offers forty-five majors in the fields of fine arts, humanities, social and natural sciences, education, business, and religion, and nine pre-professional programs, including nursing, dentistry, medicine, pharmacy, veterinary, and law. McMurry has 1,145 students. Methodist students constitute 27 percent of the student population. Ninety five percent of students are Texan. Minority groups make up approximately one-fourth of the student body. In the freshman class, 98 percent of students receive some financial aid. Fifty-three percent of students live on campus, and 75 percent of students are involved in at least one extracurricular activity. McMurry boasts a student to faculty ratio of 13:1. 91 percent of the faculty have earned a doctorate or other terminal degree in their field. McMurry is accredited by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, the Texas Education Agency, the University Senate of the United Methodist Church, the National League for Nursing, and the Texas State Board of Nurse Examiners. Indians mascot controversy McMurry's sports teams originally used Indians as their mascot. In late August 2005, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) handed down a decision calling for the eighteen universities with Native American mascots to change their names or obtain a waiver from their representative tribe for the use of the mascot name. The McMurry Indians were part of this list. The Indians nickname was chosen as a tribute to the University's first president, J.W. Hunt, who grew up on an Indian Reservation in the Indian Territory. On May 18, 2006, the NCAA rejected McMurry's appeal to keep their nickname. The school chose to appeal the ruling, and indicated their intention to do so by the June 18, 2006, deadline. According to a press release, "the University’s appeal will be based on the arbitrariness of the NCAA’s decision-making process and the inconsistent results and messages that have come from the process." Other schools, such as Florida State University, made successful appeals by garnering the endorsement of Indian tribes. Although McMurry did not actively seek an endorsement, representatives from the Kaw, Kiowa, and Comanche tribes voiced their approval of McMurry's mascot. In October 2006, McMurry's Board of Trustees decided that the university would no longer use any names for its athletic teams. Citing the school's 83-year history of honoring