Hollins a staple in sports information

September 22, 2004

Michelle Jinks is the communications director for the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference.

Arthur Hightower is the assistant director for professional development for the NCAA.

Alvin Hollins

What do they have in common? They are both Florida A&M University graduates and both received their basic training as student assistants to FAMU sports information director Alvin Hollins Jr.

Jinks and Hightower are just two of the "graduates" of the "Hollins School of Sports Information" who have gone on to make names for themselves in intercollegiate athletics administration.

“Everything I know I learned from Alvin,” Jinks said. “He taught me everything I know.”

She describes Hollins as “thorough, efficient, creative, professional, easy to work with and easy to work for.”

Jinks, who worked with Hollins for seven years, first as a student assistant and then as a full-time assistant handling women’s sports, credits Hollins with her job with the MEAC. “What I do here I learned from him,” she said. “Everybody looks up to him, and it’s about time he got some recognition for all he has done for FAMU.”

She said Hollins is among the nation’s best and could be working anywhere, “Even here,” she said, speaking of the MEAC. “But he chooses to stay at FAMU. He is one of the best and I still call on him. Just last week I had to call him because I had forgotten a statistical formula.”

Considering that he spends his office hours crammed in a 9x12 office he has to share with assistant Ronnie Johnson, computers and a fax machinbe, Hollins sighed when asked why he is still at FAMU.

“Well,” he said, seeming to search for words, “to be honest with you, I just fell in love with the place. I like where I am. I like the FAMU tradition.”

Jinks also praises Hollins for his publications. His media guides are well done and crammed with information. He anticipates questions and answers them with the information he provides in his guides.”

When Hollins became sports information director at FAMU in 1979, the Rattler athletic program was entering its first full year in NCAA Division I.

The university’s original application to be reclassified from Division II to Division I was denied, but after an appeal, the NCAA approved the reclassification just in time for the football team, which was reclassified to Division I-AA, to make the 1978 playoffs.

Under head coach Rudy Hubbard, the Rattlers beat Jackson State in the semifinal and Massachusetts in the final to win the first I-AA national championship.

So Hollins showed up to inherit public relations duties of a growing athletic program that included the defending national I-AA champion in football.

Football, by the way, is the only sport in Division I that is subdivided into I-A and I-AA. Everything else is simply Division I.

Because Division I required a minimum of 18 sports each for men’s and women’s programs, by the 1980-81 academic year FAMU had added Herb Reinhard as the women’s sports information director and he and Hollins formed FAMU’s first sports information team and began to set the standard for HBCUs and some non-HBCUs to follow.

While they worked together on major sports like football and men’s and women’s basketball, Reinhard’s primary responsibility was for all women’s sports and Hollins’ was for the men’s.

Reinhard reported to the women’s athletic director a position now called “primary” or “senior” women’s administrator — to whom all coaches of women’s sports also reported.

Hollins reported to the overall athletic director to whom all men’s coaches and other athletic department staff, including the women’s athletic director, reported.
Before long, Hollins and Reinhard had separate offices and each his own staff of assistants.

With the rapid growth and development of the women's program, Reinhard's duties expanded to marketing. His ultimate goal was administration, so when the opportunity presented itself, Reinhard accepted the athletic director's position at Valdosta State University where he remains today.

Hollins, like many transplants, fell in love with FAMU and devoted his efforts to continuing and improving the university's national reputation as a leader in the sports information field.

But as FAMU's athletic program continued to grow and demands of a Division I program increased, FAMU started to de-emphasize sports information.

When Reinhard left he was not replaced. All of his duties fell to Hollins who at the time had only student help to cover 36 men's and women's sports.

He had to try to work miracles. Football, as on most major college campuses, is the most labor-intensive sport when it comes to taking care of the needs of the media.

But during football season, men's and women's basketball seasons begin.

But he was not deterred. “While I don’t have what I need to do what I want to do, Like some of the coaches I just take on the challenge of taking less and still doing a superior job,” he said. He quickly added, “It takes a lot of prayer, but I have been blessed through the years to have the support of some outstanding people along the way.”

Hollins, whose job title (but not job description) has been changed to assistant athletic director for communications, started having to assign student assistants to handle the immediate needs of two coaches who always feel neglected because of the attention football gets.

But at the same time, Hollins has to produce their media guides working with a limited budget and try to promote basketball programs and players as well as other sports.

“Some of the other coaches get on me sometimes,” He said. “They say I’m neglecting their programs, but I see that as another challenge. I try to find ways to provide high quality service and I try to get better. There’s no need to complain; I just try to make it work,” he said.

While his efforts might not be recognized and appreciated locally, they were nationally for years.

In 1990 he received the Catl Jacox/Champ Clark Award for being Black College Sports Information Director of the Year. In 1996 he was named Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference SID of the Year; In 1998 he was named SID of the year by the New York Amsterdam News, and in 2002 he received the American Football Foundation Elmore "Scoop" Hudgens Sports Information Award.

In his 25 years at FAMU, working with unbelievably meager resources, and in a profession that many outside athletics and some in athletics neither understand nor appreciate, Hollins has become one of the most respected practitioners in his field.

He is the closest thing today to the innovative Collie J. Nicholson, the dean of black college sports information directors who revolutionized sports information among HBCUs by making Grambling’s sports information program comparable to those of Notre Dame, Ohio State and the other bigtime programs back in the day.

Ed Hill, sports information director at Howard, has known and worked with Hollins for years.

“Alvin is someone I hope we and the younger professionals will use as a model,” he said. “He works hard and accomplishes more with so little.”

Hill says Hollins’ versatility is rare. “He manages people well, he manages events well. His publications are first class and his releases are always well written,” he said.

Hollins got caught in a time warp, having to do more with less, but found a way to excel anyway.

For example, in 1979 when the University of Central Florida came to Tallahassee to play FAMU, the Golden Knights had a sports information staff of one plus student assistants, the same as Hollins. Today, the UCF SID has four full-time assistants. Hollins has one. And the difference is not because UCF is Division I-A in football. The staff had grown as the program grew in order to provide services to the other sports as well as the media.

While Hollins has not kept pace personnel wise, his responsibilities have increased. He is now responsible for both men’s and women’s sports — a responsibility once shared by two separate staffs. He also has to maintain a Web site for the department as well as prepare camera-ready copy for media guides, send out releases electronically, submit statistics to the conference and NCAA virtually as the games are being played in football and basketball.

And all of this is done by Hollins and assistant Ronnie Johnson. Other than student assistants, they have no clerical help — no secretary, not even anyone to answer the phone.

But Hollins still excels.

“Anyone who doesn’t appreciate what he has done and is doing ought to attend one of the meetings of the College Sports Information Directors of America,” Hill said. “That’ll help them see what a great job this guy is doing for FAMU.”

© Copyright 2004 Capital Outlook
Reprinted with permission

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