President Vaughn Discusses Successes at UT

UT President Ronald Vaughn was interviewed on WEDU this week about his nearly 30 years at the helm of the University.

President Vaughn Discusses Successes at UT UT President Ronald Vaughn was interviewed on WEDU this week about his nearly 30 years at the helm of the University.

Vaughn appeared on Suncoast Business Forum with host Geoff Simon, who meets the area’s leading businessmen and women to discuss what shaped them into the successes they are today.

Vaughn announced last year that he would retire this May.

When Vaughn joined The University of Tampa as a marketing professor in 1984, the University was facing many difficulties, including peeling paint on the minarets and overall signs that parts of campus had been neglected, he told Simon.

“What I really saw was opportunity. UT had great potential. I could see that from its location, was a very good location. I thought this could be much more, much bigger, much more well developed,” he said.

Over the last 15 years, Vaughn noted, approximately 700 colleges have either merged or disappeared.

“We’ve thrived, frankly, during this time period,” Vaughn said. “We’ve grown and developed and built and expanded our enrollment, despite the competitiveness.”

Vaughn said what further attracted him to the University was that he saw it was in the heart of the community and started by community leaders.

When Vaughn joined the University, the operating revenue was around $20 million with about 1,700 full-time students, he said.

A decade later, as he stepped into the role as president, the operating revenue had increased to $28 million, but the student body had shrunk to 1,420.

Now, Vaughn, said, the operating revenue stands at about $435 million, with more than 11,000 students attending the University.

Following high school, Vaughn attended Indiana State University with the plan of studying business, but he soon transitioned to marketing. After receiving his MBA, he had interest in becoming a consultant. He attended the University of Georgia to obtain his Ph.D. with that goal in mind.

Vaughn enjoyed working with students and watching them grow, witnessing them learn how to do things they never thought they could.

This sparked his interest in teaching, which led him to Bradley University, where he became an instructor in the marketing department while simultaneously working as a consultant.

After he was at Bradley for about 11 years, he discovered an opportunity at The University of Tampa.

They wanted someone to develop the marketing program.

“That’s easy for me, the attraction of building and developing a new program and helping to put it onto a path and contributing to a better business school as well, so that was the attraction to come to Tampa,” he said.

Vaughn knew families were looking to go to increasingly larger, private universities, thinking they could get more of their expectations met.

“I knew it was important for UT to move in that direction,” he said. “And now we are. We’re in the top 4% of private universities by our enrollment size, so that’s quite a change from too small, to now, one of the largest and most well-developed private universities in the country.”

For this year’s class, he said, 40,000 applicants are vying for 3,000 seats.

There are roughly 70 buildings that have been constructed since the early years when Vaughn joined the University.

“We’ve rebuilt the entire campus. All of the old buildings that were maintenance problems and had various issues with them are all gone,” he said. “And we’ve been building new ones, including buildings that are underway now and more planned for the future.”

When looking at the budget, Vaughn said he always starts with academics and what’s needed to build better academic programs, support new programs and add and pursue the most challenging accreditations.

Ultimately, the primary focus for Vaughn is continuing to build a vibrant learning community. The University’s over 10,000 events per year, 16,000 internship opportunities and about 30 different ways of experiential learning contribute to this goal.

To view the entire interview with President Vaughn, visit wedu.org/shows/suncoast-business-forum/.

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