Crimson and Gold Connection; Dr. Rusty Jones

Welcome to Crimson and Gold Connection. I am Dustin Driver. Today's guest is Dr. Rusty Jones, Professor of Music here at Pittsburgh State University. Dr. Thank you so much for coming in. Thank you for having me. And you are about done with your time here, 45 years at Pittsburgh State University. Right. And that's an amazing achievement. Well, when I came here, I was expecting to go somewhere else. And when I got on the plane from University of Wisconsin, they said it looks really good. And then the job fell through. And I was scrambling around. And I said, that one looks good. So I applied here. I got my PhD and got married and got the job all in the same month. Wow. And when I came here, I was pretty heavily involved in research and had intended to stay here for maybe two, three, four years. And perhaps go into an institution with a little more research orientation that would be helpful for me. Instead, I ended up getting involved with having to become more proficient on the Obo, which I already was pretty

good at the bassoon. And I found that I really didn't want to give up playing and teaching music. And although I would have gone back to Indiana University where I was a finalist about four years later, other than a few jobs like that, I said, I want to do it all. So I did a few research studies early on. And then my role has always been evolving and changing. And I look back at it with no regrets. Your path can take a lot of different directions. Sometimes it just seems by chance that some things happen. And I was pretty fortunate here in that I've had really good colleagues in the department. And we had good administration in the department. I especially was, I think probably if I had not had Dr. Gene Valene as chair for, I don't know, maybe 18 or 19 years, I probably would have moved on anyway. But part of the reason I've stayed is that I've been able to have a lot of

variety in my work. And I've taught a lot of different things at different times and even been involved in administration for about four years. So it's been a good ride. And I have no regrets. So you grew up on the Eastern Party United States and came here. You did not plan on being a teacher. Did you have other aspirations then? Is that what I'm getting? When I graduated from Duke University, I had a teaching degree. But I didn't know for sure that I wanted to teach. I was thinking about medicine and law and dentistry. And then I said, I can't spend that much time in school. So I said, let me try teaching and see how I do. And after a year and a half, I said, I love teaching. And I think I can be pretty good at it and spend 45 years at it. Well, I was a graduate assistant teaching two years of educational psychology at Indiana University when they talked me into doing my doctorate. I had just planned on doing a master's and going on, but I was mentored into continuing.

So I enjoyed that aspect as well. You can't do everything, but it's enjoyable to take different paths in the same career. And I've been fortunate enough to do that. And it's like having different challenges. One of the challenges has been teaching an instrumental methods course. I found it easier to teach the graduate courses, which I thoroughly enjoy. But in the undergraduate level, I tried something different. I've been thinking about it for two or three years. And I tried flipping the class. That's a classroom. That's a new expression. And I read about it for maybe five, six, seven years. And so I decided to have each of the students teach a chapter in the textbook. And from my point of view, it's worked out very well. I feel quite good about this graduating class or the students who are going to be student teaching next year. They've seen more comfortable.

And they have three teaching experiences as part of the class. They give a book report to the class. They also teach a chapter to the class. So I just think their level of comfort and security and being in front of groups is pretty high. And I've been very pleased with that result this year. So I guess one of the morals is you're never too old to keep learning. Well, after 45 years here, can you tell us a little bit about some of the changes you've seen since your start? And I guess your retirement here coming up. Well, when I came here, you didn't have a private phone in your room. And at one point, we got shared, I guess we forget what you used to call those party lines. And if you had a party line, I had a one with John McKay next door and we had a buzzer. So if I picked up the phone and it was for John, I would buzz him. And if you wanted to make long distance calls, you had to go through the central office to do that. So when I was trying to,

I took over the jazz ensemble after my third or fourth year here until we hired Mr. Keely. And I would wait in the room for three or four hours to get a call so that they could call some teacher in Shiny Mission or Springfield or Wichita or wherever to try to set up the jazz tour. Other than teaching, you also do a lot of performing around the area. Let's talk about that. Well, I've had the opportunity to perform on about eight or nine different instruments at one time or another with the Springfield Symphony. I used to play first oboe here and I got a chance to play English horn and today mostly bassoon. I also been able to play with a really good jazz group, the Crowder Jazz Orchestra, Dr. Todd Hastings leads and I was able to play lead alto and a number solos with them and played several solos with our jazz ensemble with Mr. Robert Keely. So it's been, it's something that I just didn't want to give up once after a few years pass.

You say that's those are opportunities that I enjoy and I won't in research type of job, I wouldn't have been doing much of that at all. Do you plan on continuing some of the side playing and performing after retirement? I hope to, yes. Oh, very good. You're a strong advocate for scholarships here at Pittsburgh State University. Well, when I came here, there was virtually no money for scholarships in our department and as you probably know, the state does not allow us to forgive scholarships like a lot of other states have been able to do. So we were able to get some help through Dr. Wilson and Dr. Ratz laugh a few years ago and we're doing a lot better than we were, but to be competitive and to get the students that we need with the quality that we need, we have to have scholarship money to be competitive and we've done so much better. There is a lot of money available by comparison when I came here, but we still have a long way to go.

Everything you've done for Pittsburgh State University is really paved off for the future. I know I've heard nothing but good things about your time here. Dr. Rusty Jones, you're rolling your eyes at me. Dr. Rusty Jones, thank you so much for coming in and speaking with us on Crimson and Gold Connection. You're back my pleasure. Thank you.