Alum Makes Things Happen


03/25/2015

Jim Collins, an SAU trustee emeritus and a retired John Deere executive, is a champion for all things diverse.

Who better, then, to help lead SAU's commitment to diversity?

Collins, a 1969 St. Ambrose grad, has held a number of influential positions in the diversity realm. Highlights include: Equal Employment Opportunity Coordinator, Deere & Co.; Director, Affirmative Action, Deere & Co.; Director, Community Relations, Deere & Co.; first full-time Director, Rock Island County (IL) Project NOW; former Chairperson, Human Rights & Employment Practices Committee, Iowa Association of Business and Industry; former Commissioner, Iowa Civil Rights Commission.

The list goes on. So, too, does Collins' list of achievements and involvement at St. Ambrose, where he served as a part-time counselor to minority students in 1998.

In 2007, Collins helped establish the university's Diversity Work Group at the direction of Sr. Joan Lescinski, CSJ, PhD, SAU's then-newly inaugurated president. The work group built upon the efforts of a Collins-assisted task force established a few years earlier by Sr. Joan's predecessor, Ed Rogalski, PhD.

"Sr. Joan said, ‘Let's make some things happen,"' remembered Collins, who subsequently participated in the university's long-range strategic planning and almost single-handedly developed a list of 101 strategic initiatives related to diversity that became part of St. Ambrose's 2020 Vision Plan.

The appointment of Ryan Saddler '95, '06 MEd as SAU's first director of diversity in 2013 was critical among those 101 initiatives and, Saddler said, the group's work continues with Collins as a partner and lead proponent.

Accomplishments include a steady increase in diversity enrollment numbers; the creation of activities specifically for international and minority students; changes to curriculum; and the development of community partnerships such as creating Martin Luther King Jr. Drive on Davenport's Marquette Street.

"There are a number of things we have done to keep diversity on the agenda, and Jim has been catalyst for much of it," Saddler said, adding that Collins has been particularly instrumental in progress toward fully endowing the Freeman Pollard Minority Scholarship program.

Collins is a very committed man, especially in regards to improving his alma mater.

"That's because Ambrose has done so much for me personally and professionally," he said. "My commitment to give back to St. Ambrose is never-ending, because the benefits of what I learned at St. Ambrose are never-ending."

Collins is driven in part to create opportunity for African- Americans, but he also fully understands that a culture of diversity goes well beyond race.

"I'm a black man," Collins said, "that's who I am, and that's my reference. But when you talk diversity you're talking culture, nationality, ethnicity, race, gender and a lot more.

"All of this is part of what the Diversity Work Group is about: To be able to embrace diversity in order to grow and then be able to go out into a very diverse world with that knowledge. If we don't do that for our students, we're not doing them the service they deserve as part of the St. Ambrose community."

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