Jack Rutt’s journey to EMU

By Bonnie Price Lofton | January 13th, 2015

Jack Rutt '72 moved from a management role in the private sector to direct EMU's information systems from 1999 to 2014. The changes he oversaw were extensive. Computer technology has grown to claim about 5% of EMU’s total budget. (Photo by Kara Lofton)

Jack Rutt ’72 moved from a management role in the private sector to direct EMU’s information systems from 1999 to 2014. The changes he oversaw were extensive. Computer technology has grown to claim about 5% of EMU’s total budget. (Photo by Kara Lofton)

After graduating in 1972 as a psychology major from EMU, Jack Rutt got his first job in the business world at Goodville Mutual Casualty Company in New Holland, Pennsylvania.

Rutt initially earned $1.85 per hour as a trainee in underwriting. Three years later – at age 25 – he was named head of the automobile underwriting department, succeeding his mentor, a pastor who was transitioning to full-time ministry work.

Suddenly, Rutt was managing a department of about a dozen people, developing underwriting procedures for no-fault automobile insurance. “The job of an underwriter is to find people you don’t want to cover with insurance and to exclude them,” he now says wryly, by way of explaining why he decided not to make a career out of the position as his predecessor had done.

Goodville did, however, expose him to the workings and possibilities of computers – the company had an IBM mainframe that processed data that Rutt’s underwriters needed.

Next life stage: one of six owners and president of an office supply and furniture business. Through the 1980s, this new company, The Office Works, added a personal computers sales division and grew to have seven retail outlets in Pennsylvania and North Carolina.

Rutt found himself writing the software code that his company needed for inventory control, accounts receivable, and service-work orders. He worked on a mini-computer that was one of the first to challenge the dominance of IBM mainframe computers for small businesses.

Ironically, the only class Rutt had ever dropped at EMU was Fortran taught by Joe Mast, because the challenging class didn’t seem worth it when Rutt already had a full courseload. As a result, Rutt had to learn about computer technology the hard way – on the job.

Rutt and his partners sold their computer division to a national chain in 1990. Almost immediately, Rutt was recruited to be systems manager for a health maintenance organization affiliated with Blue Shield of Pennsylvania. There he supervised a small group of employees responsible for keeping three high-availability, multi-million dollar computer systems running. There, too, he earned the highest annual income of his lifetime.

That work continued until Beryl Brubaker, then vice-president of enrollment at EMU, contacted him to consider the role of information systems director at EMU, where Rutt’s two children were then undergrads. Feeling called, Rutt took a substantial pay cut to come to a place in December 1999 where stability was needed – he would be the third IS director in as many years.

The changes in EMU’s information systems since 1999 have been extensive. Computer technology now claims about 5% of EMU’s total budget. Key markers: the staff nearly doubled in size under Rutt’s leadership; about every seven years, the core networking infrastructure has been replaced; its student information system was converted in 2007-09 to a new operating platform.

In May 2014, Rutt handed over his departmental leadership to someone he had trained, Ben Beachy ’02 and stepped into a pre-retirement role of doing project management and communications facilitation for EMU’s building renovations.

Rutt is married to Gloria Short Rutt 72, a schoolteacher for much of their married life. Their children are Eric Rutt ’01 and Megan Rutt Rosenwink ’02.