by Karen Brune Mathis
Managing Editor
It’s been almost a year since former Jacksonville Sheriff Nat Glover took an interim appointment to lead his alma mater, Edward Waters College, and two months since he took on the official title of president.
In that time, he’s repaired buildings, and wants to continue that process.
He’s identified inefficiencies, and intends to look for more.
He’s identified goals, and seeks to reach them,
He’s met with community leaders, and plans to meet with more.
All of that must be done so he can ask for broader support, he said.
“Once I am convinced we are operating as efficiently as we can, I can go out and address the revenue side,” Glover told the Meninak Club of Jacksonville on Monday.
Edward Waters College, along Kings Road in Northwest Jacksonville, is one of the nation’s historically black colleges and universities. It was founded in 1866 to educate newly freed slaves.
The college has more than 800 students, of which 99 percent are on financial aid, said Glover.
“I think the school has great potential, but it doesn’t escape you that it has problems,” he told the group of about 70 Meninak members at the Wyndham on the Downtown Southbank.
Glover said the college is addressing deferred maintenance at its campus and reviewing all staff positions, vendor contracts and operations, among other efforts.
Glover is a 1966 graduate of the college and attended on a football scholarship. “No way would I be standing here if it had not been for Edward Waters College,” he said.
Glover said that in high school, he had no intention of attending college, but played football and received a scholarship, primarily because of competing with an older brother. “I was Eugene Glover’s brother. I had to play football,” he said.
Glover, a football standout at the college, graduated with a bachelor’s degree in social science and joined the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office.
He was elected sheriff in 1995, serving two terms and then ran unsuccessfully for mayor. Glover was the first black sheriff in Jacksonville in more than 100 years.
Glover, who graduated from the University of North Florida in 1987 with a master of education degree, had been special adviser to UNF President John Delaney prior to his service at Edward Waters College.
“It was almost divine,” he said.
Glover explained to Meninak that as sheriff, “I arrested a whole lot of people.”
“Most had a lack of education,” he said. “Social ills would put them in the criminal justice system.”
He said that after having done that for more than 37 years, “the Lord saw fit to bring me back to my alma mater as president.”
“How many people in this country have an opportunity to go back to their alma mater as president?” he said.
Glover said the message to him was that “you spent most of your life out there arresting these people, now you can go out and harvest them and give them an education.”
He also said that the college has many goals, including one quite close to him.
“We could have one of the top criminal justice programs in the country,” he said.
The former sheriff said a Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office substation is planned on the campus within the year. It will provide classrooms and meeting spaces that can house the Edward Waters College criminal justice program.
“You have a living laboratory for criminal justice and it doesn’t hurt to have a former sheriff as president,” he said.
He also said a new free scholarship program, the “Call Me MISTER” program, would encourage African-Americans to earn a degree and agree to teach in elementary schools. The mission of Call Me MISTER, which is Mentors Instructing Students Toward Effective Role Models, is to increase the number of available teachers from diverse backgrounds.
It is a Florida minority-recruitment initiative modeled after a program at Clemson University in South Carolina.
“Seventy percent of children born in the African-American community are now born to single mothers,” said Glover. Those students would benefit from working with role models at an early age in elementary school.
Glover said that there is tremendous need for historically black colleges and universities.
He also asked for support of The Jacksonville Commitment, a program that provides scholarships to Duval County public high-school students who qualify for college but can’t afford it.
It is available for students to attend one of the four institutions of higher learning in Jacksonville, which are Edward Waters College, UNF, Jacksonville University and Florida State College at Jacksonville.
“We can do this. We can educate these young people. There are thousands of kids out there with potential if we give them the opportunity,” said Glover.
“I am on a mission,” he said
Meanwhile, Edward Waters College received some hope among some unfavorable news Thursday, according to The News Service of Florida.
Under budget proposals by the state House and Senate, Florida’s three historically black private colleges could see their state funding slashed between $2.2 million under the House proposal and $3 million under the Senate proposal because of the disappearance of federal stimulus dollars. That amounts to a reduction between 23 and 32 percent from the year before.
Along with Edward Waters College, the other two private historically black colleges in Florida are Bethune-Cookman University and Florida Memorial Univer-sity.
As deep as the cuts are, the News Service said they are nowhere near as deep as those contained in Gov. Rick Scott’s proposed budget.
His budget, released in February, completely eliminated funding for historically black colleges, except for $1.8 million for Edward Waters College. The college was spared because of efforts by Lt. Gov. Jennifer Carroll to keep funding for her hometown school in Scott’s budget.
Historically black colleges have received state funds since 1985 and are the only private colleges to receive money from the state that is not earmarked for a specific program, said the News Service.
The money is intended to boost graduation and retention rates for students.
“A lot of them are at risk and in single-family homes,” said Sen. Gary Siplin, an Orlando Democrat. He also stressed the need to continue funding financial aid programs for private school students, such as the Florida Resident Access Grant.
But with budget talks stalled between the House and Senate as larger budget issues remain unresolved, the News Service said it was unclear where negotiations stand on the relatively small, but politically important, sum given to historically black colleges.
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