EDITOR'S NOTE: This story is part of GCU's history page. All the stories can be found here:
GCU History Page | The GCU story | Grand 'Construction' University | A campus culture like no other | GCU timeline | Then and now | Did you know…? | Brian Mueller and the 'Phoenix 50' | Pioneering online education | Rise of athletics | The next 75 years
Brian Mueller walked across the sparse, small campus that was Grand Canyon University in 2008 and admittedly had his doubts. Accompanied by Stan Meyer, his longtime friend and colleague from the University of Phoenix, he saw a university with less than 1,000 traditional students on a campus that was nearly bankrupt a few years earlier, surrounded by one of the most economically challenged neighborhoods in Phoenix.
But, as Mueller contemplated an opportunity to leave his position as president of the hugely successful UoP to take the reins at Grand Canyon, he saw one other thing: a vision of what it could be.
“I looked at Stan and thought, ‘We could really do something here.’”
He also knew one other thing: They were going to need some help.
Mueller, of course, took that leap of faith, embarking on a remarkable transformation that in just 15 years led to GCU becoming the largest Christian university in the world with nearly 115,000 students. But, along with Meyer, “there were about 50 people from the University of Phoenix that wanted to come with us. There’s no way we could have done this without them.”
The “Phoenix 50” included members of the executive leadership team — Meyer, Dan Bachus, Joe Mildenhall and Dilek Marsh — as well as Provost Hank Radda and many others who became vice presidents of various departments and campus operations.
That incoming group joined a core of key existing leaders who formed the nucleus of what was to come in the next 15 years.
“When Brian left UoP, it was like the life of the party did as well,” said Helen Bleach, GCU’s Vice President of University Events and Arena Operations before retiring in 2023. “His direction and vision are key wherever he goes. I felt lost without him. So I called him and, of course, cried. Ha! I needed to be part of whatever he was planning and be a support for him if I could. Bless him, and because that was God’s plan, within a few weeks, I was at GCU!”
Early in Pete Martinez’s career at UoP, he said Mueller spoke to his group and told them the internet was going to change education, and that their small division was going to become the biggest campus at the university. At the time, Martinez said such a vision was inconceivable to his team, but “our little distance education campus grew from a little over 5,000 students to over 300,000 by the time Brian left,” he said.
After Mueller departed for GCU, Martinez visited him and took a tour of the sparsely developed campus.
“He walked around the campus, proudly pointing at buildings that didn’t exist and told me that’s where he was going to put the new stadium or that’s where the new engineering building was going to go or that was where the new library was going to be built, etc.,” said Martinez, an executive vice president of operations at Grand Canyon Education. “Anyone walking around with him that didn’t know him would think he was completely insane.”
But Martinez reflected back on the day Mueller spoke to his tiny division at the University of Phoenix. “I knew that if anyone could make Grand Canyon University successful, it would be Brian. He not only has the Midas touch, but he’s got a gift for growing anything. He makes the impossible possible through hard work, diligence, loyalty and a vision that is hard to match.”
With his team on board, Mueller and company went to work immediately, investing $100 million in an online learning management system; creating technology to streamline operational processes such as transcript evaluation, financial aid, faculty scheduling and curriculum assessments; adding curriculum in high-growth job fields such as engineering, computer science and information technology; and pouring into a disadvantaged surrounding community through a five-point plan that is unlike any other in the country.
“Brian is driven with an unrelenting will to succeed and is the definition of innovative,” said Nikki Mancuso, an executive vice president of operations at Grand Canyon Education. “One of his truly remarkable gifts is that he can inspire and motivate a team to do what would seem impossible to anyone else.”
In some respects, Mueller’s 22 years at the University of Phoenix were a detour. He grew up in a strong Christian household and began his career as a history teacher and basketball coach at a Christian high school and a small college. He and his wife, Paula, and their three children, with a fourth son on the way, were living in his brother-in-law’s 1,200-square-foot house. Mueller knew he needed to alter his plan and decided to take a job at the University of Phoenix.
Working his way up through that organization, he said he would not trade those experiences for anything because they led him to where he is today.
“I believe that was the purpose all along,” Mueller said of his faith journey. “Everything we learned in those 22 years — how to use the public markets to get access to capital, how to use technology to reach the world — there’s no Ph.D. program in the world that can teach the things we learned by doing it there. And without that knowledge and those 50 people coming, there’s no way we could do this.”
