Jeffrey Francis Bullock

You learn as a pastor, if you want to have a meaningful ministry, you have to develop your mind. You have to really enjoy people and being with people.

One of the best training grounds for being a president was all the covered dish or potluck dinners that we had in my congregations. It's very important for me to meet people, to see people, to meet them where they are. I could get more pastoral care done in a hour-and-a-half, two-hour period shaking hands with people, stopping at their tables, talking to families and children than I could in an entire week of visiting people.

It has established important qualities that I try to maintain as a president.

Some of the obvious areas are the public speaking. I do a lot of that, which is not easy to do. But in my preaching life, it's an area of discipline and academic study for me so I enjoy it a great deal and try to work at it very hard. I think there's just enormous potential through that medium of communication.

On exposure to various cultures:
One of the great things that's happening in this community - our oldest son is in pre-school, he is learning, in addition to what they learn in pre-school, he's learning Spanish and he's also learning sign language. Isn't that wonderful? Shouldn't that be part of the overall college experience? I personally think it should and I know our trustees think it should. So, yeah, there are enormous opportunities that happen globally.

On his personal style:
It's very important to me as a president that I get to know as many of our people on a first-name basis as possible. That I can know a little something about them and their lives and their families. That kind of goes back to, I would guess, pastoral background. That's an important part of who Jeffrey Bullock is.

TH: At the time of the announcement of the transformation, only two-thirds of the freshmen came back for their sophomore year and about one-third eventually graduated from the University. Have you seen a shift in those numbers?
JB: Oh, yeah, there's been a dramatic shift. Our incoming student population is growing very quickly; we are, percentage-wise, the fastest growing private school in Iowa right now. That will tail off, on purpose. We've actually exceeded our capacity and that's one of the reasons we are expanding our campus. That's a problem. It's a good problem, but also a significant challenge.

You're talking about retention and persistence, which is a key number to look at. Yeah, those numbers are up significantly and dramatically. I think we're up to probably 72 percent. It might have been lower than two-thirds. Our incoming classes are larger and our graduation rate is larger. So we have goals in mind of where we want to be benchmarked against other institutions. We're actually further ahead in some areas than we thought we would be at this point in our growth.

Regarding collaboration with Northeast Iowa Community College (and other institutions):
If you believe with a passion as I think I do - and we do - that education is really the door to opportunity, you suddenly, if you really believe, your goal, and my goal as a president is to eliminate as many barriers to access as possible. Those are financial. Those are cultural. Those are programmatic.

That if education is opportunity and if what is unique about what we're doing here is in addition to the intellectual, we're also doing something with the spiritual and the moral and the ethical.

Regarding UD's programs in Asia:
There was the foresight of some very smart people, particularly Dr. (Paul) Laube (a late trustee of the university), who was a missionary in Chengdu, China, where I visited this summer; it was a very moving experience for me to be there where he started.

Now, what I can say when I was in China this summer working with a lot of Asian cultures. The quality of the relationship is very important and the longevity of the relationship is very important. A number of those who have gone before me have done a very good job of making sure that our relationship with many of our Asian partners has been a quality relationship. That taught me something not only about education, but that taught me something about our emerging, not to be too broad here, but that really was a very, very important lesson for me to experience firsthand.

Regarding athletic programs in the Iowa Conference in general and UD in particular:
There are 19 intercollegiate sports. I'd be more comfortable, frankly, and I think it's smarter initially and business-wise to have the NCAA minimum, which is 12 or 13. If we want to have 19 fine, but let's allow for flexibility.

If we want to bring in other sports, say crew or field hockey or lacrosse or something that allows us to recruit geographically, all of us to recruit geographically around something that's maybe not a traditional sport to the Midwest or to Iowa, that makes great sense to me. But that would be an area where I'm working.

If there were kind of softball editorials to that effect from the TH editorial board that promoted that, that would help a great deal.

TH: You're also the president of Great Dubuque Development Corporation. Where does that fit into your set of values, your perspective on things in terms of being a leader in the community, not just on the campus?
JB: Well, GDDC is an easy organization to be a part of. The University has, through its various connections and board members, was one of the originators of GDDC. It's an easy cause to be a part of because it's about a community ... it's about providing opportunity for a community that frankly we love very much and we feel privileged to be a part of.

Do I wish I could spend more time doing my work through GDDC or chamber or any other organization? Yeah, I do. But it's an opportunity to ... you know, what's meaningful for me, with GDDC as an example, I'm not interested in businesses that frankly don't provide opportunities for people should they choose to do so to raise their families.

That just is fundamental to me. We need to be about the business as a community that encourages investment in this community, that encourages private and public partnerships and investment in this community and that fundamentally provides people who, not a free ride by any stretch of the imagination, but people who are motivated and desire a job that pays them the kind of income or wage or salary that allows them to raise a family and provide education and have a good life.

That's what I'm interested in. So in a small way through GDDC, I get to be a part of those conversations and a part of a group of very smart energetic people under leadership of Rick Dickinson and others through the Chamber and our partnerships and collaborations in the city that makes this really a privilege to be a part of.

I can honestly say, having been born in Iowa, I've spent a fair amount of time in Iowa and on the fringes. This isn't the Iowa that I grew up in or that I remember. You look what the leaders of this community have been able to accomplish on behalf of this community and those leaders are in public positions, in businesses ... it's pretty remarkable, and yet I don't think we're there. I think we have a lot to do. So this is my way to be a part of it.

TH: You mentioned the fundraising and the travel. Half your time? More than half?
JB: I'd say half my time. At least half of my time is dedicated to service on boards and church committees and different kinds of endeavors as that. Then traveling, fundraising, visiting donors, representing the University at different functions. I spend a fair amount of time in Washington talking to our legislators. We have a fair number of alums in that part of the country.

I've got to say that I enjoy that. I enjoy working on developing relationships with people who love and support the University or people who have yet to fall in love with it that maybe one day could.

As I reflect on it, I think one of the reasons I enjoy that is fundamentally I'm a pastor at that point. I'm interested in their lives and finding ways that their lives connect with our mission, if those ways do exist.

On University of Dubuque benefactor Jackaline Baldwin Dunlap:
Jackaline, I think, is a good story of this University. She was a farm girl and literally came off the farm from a family that didn't think women exactly should be educated. She received an education and the University gave her that education. She became the first female licensed stockbroker in the state and her business, of course, was anticipating the future and she did it very well. And continues to be a wonderful, wonderful supporter of what we're doing here.

TH: What is the enrollment, with the seminary and the undergrads and the grad program?
JB: Overall, with all of our programs, we're hovering right around 1,200 full-time students.

Now, what's not reflected in those numbers are a number of our on-line programs and certificate programs. To our theological seminary, we're involved in a pretty exciting program, a certified lay pastor program. We received a grant from the Lilly Endowment a couple of years ago. We provide training on-line to folks literally all over the world to serve congregations primarily in the upper Midwest, congregations that can no longer afford full-time pastoral leadership. That would not show up in our numbers, but it is an important part of our ministry and our outreach.

We're about 1,200 students now. And we're trying to manage our growth. It will sound funny, given where we've been, for me to say I'm worried about growth. But we want to make sure that as we grow, we're also providing the kind of contact and care, customer care, that serves students in the way that they need to be served.

On what he sees as a spirit of collaboration on campus:
Our new dean in the college (John Stewart) was actually my doctoral adviser at Washington. One of the books for which he is best known is a book titled, "Bridges Not Walls."

I think that sums up very nicely what we've tried to be about here. That's not just administration and faculty or professional staff or staff. I think what you'd find - I hope what you'd find - is that genuine spirit across this campus.
Previous Newsmaker interviews