6 minute read
Coming Full Circle
By Carolanne Roberts
Ask Rob Jenkins a few key questions, and you immediately get the gist of who he is. Where are you from? Starkville.
How many colleges did you consider? One. Mississippi State. No question.
What was your career direction? I wanted to be part of the University.
Where were you on the evening of June 28, 2021? Cheering the Bulldogs on to a national baseball title at TD Ameritrade Park in Omaha, NE. Where else?
Jenkins has been part of the University community since his parents brought him to the college town not long after his birth in Memphis (which he considers a mere technicality of time and place). Just a few months ago, as students were returning to campus for the fall semester, he returned to the College of Business as Senior Director of Development.
“I walked back into McCool Hall and the familiar surroundings made me feel at home,” he shares. “I’m so excited to be back where I want to be the rest of my career.”
This is a most welcome “round two” for Jenkins. In 2011, he joined Dean Sharon Oswald, who was just arriving herself, to make a difference in the business program.
“I had spent some years as Director of Development in the College of Education and in the College of Arts and Sciences, but the College of Business always interested me,” says Jenkins.
It was an exhilarating time for both the new Dean and the new Development Director.
“We were raising money for scholarships and faculty support and to further enhance programs,” explains the 1992 BBA graduate. “And we later opened the E-Center (MSU Center for Entrepreneurship and Outreach), which was a cool project to work on. Dean Oswald had gone to Dr. [David] Shaw, the Provost, asking that the COB drive the University’s effort as a collaboration between Business and Engineering. Now it’s grown with such success that the Center is experiencing a renovation and expansion.”
Years before, Jenkins had entertained the notion of becoming a teacher and coach, so the opportunity to serve as Associate Director for Development in MSU Athletics lured him away from the COB in 2017.
“I got in on the tail end of fundraising for the new Dudy Noble Field. There’s no other place like it when it comes to college baseball, and I saw the facility built from the ground up,” he says.
During his six-year tenure, MSU Athletics also raised funds for the Rula Tennis Pavilion indoor tennis facility and for a renovation to basketball’s Humphrey Coliseum.
And, yes, he was front and center – personally and professionally – when the Diamond Dawgs pulled off the title championship in Omaha.
“How fitting it was to win our first national championship in the sport of baseball,” says Jenkins. “Baseball is who we are, the most successful program in our sports history, so to win in baseball is just the way it should be, right?”
He thrilled to the multitude of loyal fans who made the journey to the College World Series.
“Ameritrade Park seats about 24,000, and I think about 22,000 of those were Bulldog fans,” claims Jenkins, who leads the pack as a true Bulldog.
After his successful time in Athletics, his heart led him back to the COB.
“There were certain parts of academic fundraising I really missed,” he remarks. “I especially missed going to lunch or dinner with donors and their scholarship recipients. I loved sitting back and hearing the recipients talk about their career dreams, then hearing the donors share their own personal career paths that led to where they are today.”
From the development standpoint, he adds, the best part of that interaction is simple.
“You’ve connected a donor and helped a student – which is why we’re doing what we do. We still have first generation college students where even the difference of $1,000 can determine whether they come to school or not, so scholarships are a very important piece. It’s rewarding for us all.”
Jenkins’ own college years were a double-header of work and study. Nose to grindstone, “get ’er done” days and nights, balancing management of an athletic shoe store in the College Park shopping center with earning his degree. The degree prepared him for the world ahead – a big, puzzling world.
“I knew I wanted to do something within business, but what?” he recalls.
That’s when fate and connections started taking over. The shoe shop owner offered the soonto-be grad the chance to buy the business, and the answer was an appreciative but heartfelt “no” on Jenkins’ part. He didn’t feel ready to own his own business. Then along came a good friend who shared Jenkins’ resumé with Sanderson Plumbing Products in Columbus.
“I thought I’d go to Sanderson for the experience of a job interview and nothing more,” he says. “But I ended up with a job as Regional Sales Manager out of Starkville.”
By then he’d met wife Annice, a Delta State University education graduate. (They had met at his grandfather’s funeral, which is another story altogether.)
“A year later, we had twin boys about to come into the world, and I didn’t want to be on the road,” he says. “I was at a football game when the next thing happened.”
Another friend asked if Jenkins had ever considered banking.
“I told him I could bring seven years of sales management experience to the table, and he said, ‘I can teach you the rest.’”
Thus began a period with AmSouth Bank (now Regions). During this time, he also served the community as leader of the United Way campaign. At one point, he was recruiting someone to head the MSU United Way segment, and she told him about several development jobs on campus. It was this that brought him to a development position with the College of Education and all that has followed.
For Jenkins, Mississippi State has become more than an alma mater, a winning baseball team and a series of accomplished career moves. It’s now a family affair. Following 30 years of teaching in the public school system, wife Annice now serves as a Program Manager for MSU’s Mississippi Excellence in Teaching Program, which offers scholarships to supply Mississippi schools with qualified teachers. Sons Braxton and Brooks, both 2022 COB graduates, have launched their careers: Braxton uses his Professional Golf Management degree as Head Golf Professional at Mossy Oak Golf Club in West Point, MS, and Brooks, who has a business administration degree, serves as a commercial lender for Renasant Bank in Starkville.
To top it off, Rob Jenkins is now back where he belongs, joining new Dean Scott Grawe and Director of Development Stephen Lack to lead the charge for the COB’s new vision.
