03-05-2025
Dunn makes the switch from business to UTPB
May 2—Throughout his life, Rusty Dunn has given back to his community and now he's doing it from the higher education stage as University of Texas Permian Basin's Development Coordinator.
A native of Odessa, Dunn lived in the Midland and Dallas areas before returning home. He owned a Chick-fil-A franchise for 20 years.
Dunn said he had a "kind of semi-retirement" in August 2024. He decided to part ways because he and his wife were about to become empty nesters and he wanted to try something new.
"This is very different than what I had done in the past and so just kind of looking for a new adventure," Dunn said.
His job involves fundraising, but Dunn said there are a lot of things going on.
"There's capital campaign projects. We work with scholarships and endowments and professorships. We work with the deans of the different colleges to make sure that all of the money that has been promised is brought in, given, given out to the student ... following it all the way through," Dunn said.
He added that they have two staff members on the team who make sure they're in compliance.
Although he hasn't been at UTPB very long, Dunn said he has absolutely loved it.
"The amount of generosity in this community is unbelievable, and when you're working with people that are so anxious to, one, be generous for the good of the community. ... Not only does it help the students, it's helping the community overall. It's just a really neat thing," Dunn said.
Proverbs 11:25 says, "Whoever brings blessings will be enriched and one who waters will himself be watered."
"I think that's something that you always should do is keep God's money in circulation. I'm not taking anything with me when I leave and so whatever I can do to help people ... I had the pastor of the church that I grew up in, he always said, You never see a hearse with a U-Haul behind it headed to the cemetery. ... My wife and I have always tried to be as generous as possible. The people that we're getting to work with and companies ... there's an enormous amount of generosity in this community," Dunn said.
One of the big things he is working on with others are capital campaigns. Having been in business so long in Odessa, he's built relationships — whether with Chick-fil-A or his church, First Baptist — and that is helping with fundraising.
He has known Vice President for External Relations Advancement Jacqui Gore for more than 25 years and knows her family.
"She has always been somebody that I've admired ... This just kind of rolled into that," Dunn said.
Asked how what he's doing now is different than Chick-fil-A, he said Chick-fil-A typically leads with food — providing lunches, for example.
"That would be probably the biggest scenario just on a much smaller scale, dollar-wise, than what we're doing here. If we donated a meal ... and here we're dealing with thousands of dollars. ... One of the things that we try to do is have an impact on people, and that was the reason why I was at the ECISD thing was just an impact. How do you do that? So many of my team members from over there either they didn't have a great home life and so we were able to make an impact on them in a very positive way with what we were doing," Dunn said.
That included the people he worked with and the people they served.
Some people ate with them three to six times a week.
"We get to know who they are. We get to know what their order is. That's John. That's a number one with no pickles and a large Dr Pepper. And, you know, so whenever you're able to have what we would call a relational scenario versus a transactional, it makes all the difference in the world," Dunn said.
The other part, he said, is that everyone has a story of where they came from and their life experiences.
"That was one of the things that we always try to share with with our team members. You never know what has just happened to that person before they came in, they may have gotten a phone call that somebody's died, or somebody's lost their job, or they're now getting a divorce, or their son is getting shipped off to war or you just never know. Those were the kind of things that we tried to teach our team members to be able to really reach in with folks," Dunn said.
Dunn earned a bachelor's degree in finance from Texas Tech University.
He got into restaurant work because he needed a job.
"And according to John Maxwell, job stands for just over broke. I was actually one of five members of my family that worked for Chick-fil-A when we were in high school. I worked a year at Chick-fil-A in the mall in Midland, and then when we moved to Dallas, I went to work for another Chick-fil-A for five more years while I was in high school and college," Dunn said.
He added that being a person of faith, it appealed to him that they were closed on Sunday.
He and his wife Heather have two daughters.
Gore is glad to have Dunn on board.
"We're excited to have Rusty on the External Relations team. He brings 30 years of business experience and solid Permian Basin relationships to this role. Rusty loves people and that's what our work is all about," Gore said.
