Paul Jarley, the new dean of the UCF College of Business Administration, still remembers what it was like to be a college student and that’s part of the reason he uses all means to stay in touch with those aspiring professionals.
“I was a first-generation college student,” Jarley said. “I know that a great education opens your eyes to a world of possibilities, helps you make good choices and gives you the confidence, skills and ability to compete with anyone, anywhere.”
That’s one reason he’s so excited to be joining UCF, a university that has experienced unprecedented growth and success in just 50 years, he said.
“Leading a college that delivers on its promise to transform students is what gets me up in the morning,” said the Michigan native.
And he’ll use all means to help connect with students and see that transformation. That’s one of the reasons he was attracted to UCF. As a young institution it embraces creative approaches such as using social media. Jarley used as a way to stay in touch with students at his former institution – the University of Nevada at Las Vegas.
“Social media allows me to make a big place feel small,” he said. “I can directly communicate with large numbers of students, faculty, staff and friends of the college, many of whom I may rarely meet face to face.”
Jarley plans to use Twitter and his own blog as one of several methods for keeping connected to students at UCF and providing the community access to him.
“Social media gives me the opportunity to understand the UCF experience in real time, give students advice about how to get the most out of their time in college, and engage the UCF College of Business Administration community in a dialogue about our future,” he said.
The experienced educator, who joined UCF in July, is looking forward to bringing together his global experience with the energy and enthusiasm of the UCF community.
Jarley served as dean and professor of management for the past five years at UNLV. Prior to that position, he was the senior associate dean and the Gatton Endowed Professor of Management at the University of Kentucky. He has also held faculty and administrative positions at Louisiana State University and the University of Iowa. He earned his Ph.D. in Industrial Relations from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
He has extensive global academic experience. He was a visiting professor at Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, China and has taught at the Burgundy School of Business, Dijon Bourgogne, France. He was a visiting Fulbright Research Scholar at the University of Melbourne in Australia.
In addition to his academic experience, Jarley is widely published in numerous peer-reviewed journals including Industrial Relations Journal, British Journal of Industrial Relations, Journal of Labor Research and the Academy of Management Journal and is currently on the editorial board at the Journal of Labor Research.
Follow him on Twitter @pauljarley and read his weekly blog at www.bus.ucf.edu/dean [1].