“We just never felt like it was a fair assessment,” he said.
Jones, who looked at the report for the first time Monday, Aug. 23, said the topic of participating hadn’t come up, but if it had, it would have taken a back seat to his main objective: turning around the struggling school.
When Jones arrived on campus in 2008, the university was facing falling enrollment, a $440,000 deficit, and $1.2 million in loans the university had borrowed to cover operating expenses.
That summer, seven positions were cut, staff compensation was reduced by 6 percent, and two nonclassroom buildings were closed.
Two years later, the staff has been made whole and the college is operating on budget, Jones said.
Enrollment is trending upward as is the retention rate — currently around 92 percent.
“We’re making progress, but we still have a lot of work to do,” he said.
He said he would like to see the school’s reputation improve as well as graduation rates.
On the other hand, he said he’s not sure the school would want to rank high in some areas, such as ACT/SAT scores.
“Somebody has to take the college-ready students who can’t score in the upper 10 percentile,” he said. “A kid can go here and succeed where he might not have been able to even get into another school.”
That’s not at the exclusion of high-performing students — such as the two incoming high school valedictorians who will suit up for the football team this fall.
“We’re not ready or may never be ready to meet the U.S. News & World Report (rankings),” he said. “We just need to concentrate on making us stronger so students get the kind of education and experience they come here to get.”
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