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CORVALLIS - Tom Usher, senior director with the Portland office of global real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield, Inc., has been elected chairman of the Oregon State University Foundation Board of Governors.

Usher will serve a one-year term, overseeing what foundation representatives describe as one of the most ambitious fundraising agendas in Oregon State University history.

A 1970 graduate of the OSU College of Business, Usher has been active with the foundation since the 1980s when he chaired the organization's real property committee. In 1992, he was elected a trustee and served the board as treasurer in 1999-2000 and, last year, as vice-chair. In addition to his leadership with the university, Usher serves on the board of the Portland Chamber of Commerce and is a founding member of the Ambassador Program, a project of the Portland Development Commission designed to advance economic development goals for the metro Portland area. He is a past president of the Multnomah Athletic Club and serves as chair of the club's long-range planning committee.

Usher succeeds Margaret "Peggy" Wood, an OSU alum who is a financial management executive with the Portland firm of Hallock/Modey, Inc. Wood remains on the board as immediate past chair.

Duane McDougall, CEO of Willamette Industries, Inc. and a 1974 graduate of the Oregon State College of Business, is the foundation's new vice-chair.

Together with foundation president and CEO Rebecca Cole, the Foundation Board of Governors manages more than $350 million in assets held by the foundation on behalf of Oregon State University. Founded in 1947, the foundation represents one of the largest public university asset bases in the country.

The foundation is directing a multi-year campaign to raise $132 million in private support of a $180-million effort to advance the OSU College of Engineering to one of the 25 programs of its kind in the country.

The foundation's Board of Governors consists of 13 volunteer alumni and friends who work with the leadership of the university and the foundation to set policy on fundraising, investment and management of the foundation's activities.

Usher is a member of Phi Delta Theta national fraternity, as well as the Waverley Country Club and the Arlington Club. A grandson of the founder of Cushman & Wakefield, Usher is married to Ann Usher, a 1970 graduate of the University of Washington. They have two sons, Andrew, a graduate of Colorado College, and Kent, a student at Colorado College.