Vinson Pressley/Staff Writer
Scott Jones has been selected to take over the reins of the Wolfe University Center on April 15 and will serve as its director in place of Elie “Elias” Bardawil, who served as its interim director since October 2012.
The former Director of the WUC was Gregory Olson, who retired in Oct., and has worked for Biscayne Bay Campus for over 30 years.
According to Eric Arneson, assistant vice president of Student Affairs, the process of selecting a new director for the WUC took several months to complete and included a large nationwide search, a search committee made up of Biscayne Bay Campus students and staff and advertising.
Once the search committee reviewed the candidates that applied for the position, they narrowed down the candidate pool down to 3 applicants. Those three applicants were invited by Arneson for on-campus interviews in February.
When Arneson conducted his interviews with the candidates, he mentioned the three criteria he was looking for in the candidate, which were: someone who had experience with college students, especially with student unions, someone with at least a master’s degree in education and someone who will understand and appreciate the diversity of the University’s student body.
Based on the criteria and the recommendations of the search committee and evaluations done by students and faculty on the 3 candidates, Jones was selected for the position.
Jones is currently director of the Student Union at American University and several years ago, Jones was residence coordinator at the Biscayne Bay Campus.
“[Jones] understands this campus inside [and] out,” said Arneson.
As director of the WUC, he will have numerous responsibilities such as overseeing the Team Ropes Adventure Challenge Course. The TRAC ropes course consists of a series of team-building exercises designed to create group cohesion.
According to Arneson, one of Jones’ responsibilities will be to find ways to market the ropes course and WUC “internally and externally” in order to generate another source of revenue for the University.
The objective is to advertise the space to students as well as the general public to use utilize the ropes course or hold events at WUC like conferences or weddings.
Another responsibility that Jones will inherit when he arrives on April 15 will be the $3 million facelift that BBC will go through.
Renovations have been approved to make BBC more vibrant and to create “more opportunity for student energy,” said Arneson, who also said he shares this responsibility as well.
Arneson mentioned that since Jones will be director of WUC and the renovations will affect several departments, Jones will have to create relationships with students and staff.
Arneson also discussed that jones will face the new challenge of limited classroom space, which involves having classes held in WUC 221, WUC 222 and WUC 223 and in the Mary Ann Wolfe Theater, which means that Jones will have to work with instructors and faculty to ensure that there will be no interference between programming and class time.
Jones has experience with renovation projects and his knowledge may very well carry over into the new position he is set to take in April.
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