Britt Reams Coming Home

Britt Reames to Join Bulldog Baseball Staff

Charleston, S.C.– The Citadel Baseball team announced the addition of former major league pitcher and Citadel Hall of Fame inductee Britt Reames to the staff on Friday. “It is an honor to be coming back to my alma mater,” said Reames. “Getting a chance to be along side Coach Jordan and Coach Beckley, two people I have tremendous respect for, really is something special. I look forward to being part of championships teams in the near future.”

Reames will serve as the pitching and catching coordinator on a day-to-day basis while assisting in the recruiting process. The Upstate native has spent the last three seasons as the recruiting coordinator and the pitching coach at Furman. “We are very excited Britt has decided to return to The Citadel family,” said Bulldogs Head Coach Fred Jordan, who is entering his 21^st season at the helm of the baseball program. “He brings unbelievable energy and knowledge to our program.”

A Seneca, S.C., product, and 1996 graduate of The Citadel, Reames spent six seasons in the major leagues from 2000-06 with four different clubs, including St. Louis, Montreal, Oakland, and Pittsburgh. He also played three seasons of winter ball in the Dominican Republic during that span.  While at The Citadel, he posted an 18-7 record and 2.03 ERA over four seasons and twice earned All-Southern Conference honors while helping the Bulldogs to a pair of league tournament championship, a regular season championship and a pair of NCAA Tournament appearances.  Reames was inducted into The Citadel’s Athletic Hall of Fame in November 2008 and is still fifth on the all-time list with 296 career strikeouts.

Selected by the St. Louis Cardinals in the 17th round of the 1995 Major League Draft, he worked his way up through the minor leagues before making his major league debut with the Cardinals in 2000, going 2-1 with a 2.88 ERA over 40 2/3 innings of work. He was a credited with the win in the Cardinals’ game three series clinching playoff victory over the Atlanta Braves in the 2000 National League Division Series.  In December of 2000 he was traded to the Montreal Expos, where he spent three seasons. He later made appearances with the Oakland Athletics in 2005 and Pittsburgh Pirates in 2006 before returning to the Upstate.

Reames is married to the former Laura Carmody of Chicago, Ill. The couple has a one-year old son, Michael Britt.

General Rosa’s Summer letter to Alumni

There have been a number of important actions taken recently at the college I would like to share with you.

Honor, Duty, Respect
We must never be satisfied with our efforts to reinforce the values and traditions of our college. At its June meeting The BOV responded to the recommendation of The Citadel Experience Integration Team to capture our core values in three powerful words: Honor, Duty, and Respect.

• Honor: The commitment to honor springs from the Corps’ Honor Code, but is a life-long obligation to moral and ethical behavior that should be embraced by all of us who are associated with The Citadel.

• Duty: First and foremost duty means accepting and accomplishing assigned responsibilities, both on and off campus. At The Citadel, we expect cadets to recognize their duty to perform academically and as a member of the Corps. We expect CGC and Evening Undergraduate students to accept their responsibility to maximize the opportunity of a Citadel education. Duty also entails accepting the consequences associated with performance and actions, and holding others accountable as well. Duty is a call to serve others before self.
• Respect: Treating others with dignity and worth precludes prejudice, discrimination, or harassment. Additionally, respect for others requires students to respect the positions of those in authority, including faculty, staff, administrators, active duty personnel and the leadership of the Corps of Cadets.

College Budget/Performance Raise

The BOV also approved at its June meeting the college’s 2011-12 budget, which includes a tuition and fees increase of 3.5 percent (to $10,216) for in-state students and 9 percent (to $27,033) for out-of-state students. We face a balancing act – keep costs as low as possible while securing sufficient revenues to ensure the high-quality academic and leadership experiences that our students and families expect from The Citadel. Families are indicating that we offer the value they seek. For the fifth year in a row, we anticipate over 700 freshmen.

The 2011-12 budget also includes a 1% performance increase, effective 1 July 2011, for full-time faculty and staff who received exceptional or successful job ratings. Despite a seven percent cut in the college’s appropriation for 2011-12, we have positioned the college fiscally to be able to offer this modest performance increase and recognize the many efforts of our faculty and staff on behalf of the college.

Memorandum of Understanding with TCF

As we move the college forward we must be as fiscally stable as possible and expand the sources of revenue on which we depend. The college employed the Boston Consulting Group to gauge our fiscal condition and identify how best to proceed. BCG found that the college faced persistent funding deficits (including insufficient funding for deferred maintenance), in a large part resulting from state appropriation cuts. Additionally, the college was not focused on programs and initiatives with the greatest potential to generate revenue and lacked fundraising that was sufficiently organized to maximize donations.

As I’ve mentioned previously, The BOV and The Citadel Foundation Board of Directors recognize the importance of coming together to support the future of the college. In that spirit the BOV and TCF board have agreed to a one-year Memorandum of Understanding that helps the college to implement the BCG recommendations. The MOU creates a framework for ensuring our capacity to provide the high quality academic and leadership experience our students, families and alumni expect.

The MOU:

• Recognizes the creation of the position of Vice President for Institutional Advancement in order to more effectively structure development operations to maximize fundraising. The salary for this position will be funded by TCF.
• Provides access to TCF financial resources to fund the initial steps necessary to implement revenue generating opportunities, along with accountability requirements to ensure their effective application.
• Establishes the basis for a stronger relationship with TCF.

Our efforts to contain costs and generate more revenue will permit our faculty and staff to continue their work toward achieving our vision – excellence in the education of principled leaders – undistracted by the kind of fiscal challenges we have faced in recent years. Challenges remain, but with your support we will emerge stronger than ever.

BOV Actions

The BOV also took the following actions at its June meeting:

• Approved the creation of the position of Vice President for Institutional Advancement.
• Approved locating a ring monument on the parade field, pursuant to an examination of underground utilities.
• Revisited the college’s disciplinary system and established the BOV as the appellate authority for suspensions, dismissals and expulsions.
• Clarified that violations of The Citadel Drug Use Policy carry punishments up to and including expulsion.
• Revised college regulations to permit Veteran Students to participate in ROTC.

Again thank you for your loyal support of our alma mater.

John W. Rosa

Lieutenant General, USAF (Retired)

President, The Citadel