NEWBERG — Officials of a small Christian university say a life-size cardboard reproduction of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama was hung from a tree on the campus, an act with racial overtones that outraged students and school leaders alike.

George Fox University President Robin Baker says a custodian discovered the effigy early Tuesday and removed it. University spokesman Rob Felton said Wednesday that the commercially produced reproduction had been suspended from the branch of a tree with fishing line around the neck.

Taped to the cardboard cutout of the black senator from Illinois was a message targeting participants in Act Six, a scholarship program geared toward increasing the number of minority and low-income students at several Christian colleges, mostly in the Northwest.

The message read, “Act Six reject.”

The disturbing image recalled the days of lynchings of blacks, and was all the more incongruous at a university founded by Quaker pioneers in 1891. Felton said he had been at the school since he enrolled two decades ago, and “I’ve never experienced or heard of any type of overt racial act.” He said the school doesn’t believe students are in jeopardy.

At the end of the college’s regular chapel service Wednesday morning, Baker told students he was “disheartened and outraged.”

“It has been my dream to establish a university that more adequately represents the kingdom of God,” he said. “This act causes some to question our commitment.”

“What I’ve learned is, we still have work to do,” he said.