June 25, 2009
SAN ANTONIO, Texas (Thursday, June 25, 2009) – Longtime Southeast Missouri State Sports Information Director Ron Hines was among four people honored at the College Sports Information Directors of America’s (CoSIDA) annual national convention held this week at San Antonio, Texas. The prestigious honor is presented to CoSIDA members who have served at least 25 years in the profession and have, or are, retiring or leaving the field of sports information.
Hines has served Southeast Missouri State as its lone Sports Information Director for 29 years. He will officially retire next Tuesday, June 30.
Before arriving in Cape Girardeau, Hines previously served for two years as an assistant SID at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale (SIUC) under the tutelage of Fred Huff as well as serving four years as a student assistant at the University of Missouri under Bill Callahan.
A graduate of the University of Missouri's prestigious Journalism College (1965), Hines is a veteran print and broadcast journalist with experience in daily and weekly newspaper operations as well as radio and television.
Hines is a member of CoSIDA and has written over 21 award winning publications including four judged "Best in the Nation."
Hines has worked a record 851 consecutive men's basketball games at Southeast Missouri State. He has not missed a game since 1980. His streak came to an end on March 28, 2009 when the Redhawks played Austin Peay on the final regular season game of the year.
Hines has mentored numerous assistants and graduate assistants at Southeast Missouri State that have gone on to successfull careers in sports information. Currently eight of his former employees are SID's including Brad Kirtley (Austin Peay), John Kean (Missouri University of Science and Technology), Rick Kindhart (Missouri State), Justin Maskus (Missouri Southern), Corey Miggins (Chicago State) Kyle Schwartz (The Ohio Valley Conference), Brian Kunderman (Saint Louis University) and his current assistant at Southeast Missouri State, Patrick Clark.
Hines and his wife Mary have three children and seven grandchildren.
CoSIDA was founded in 1957. Previously, sports information directors, as a group, were a part of the American College Public Relations Association but most SIDs at those ACPRA meetings felt that a separate organization was needed. There were 102 members at the original meetings; since that time, CoSIDA has grown to over 1,800 members in the United States and Canada. The association is designed to help the SID at all levels.
Jeff Honza, former Associate Director of Media Services at SIUC, will take over the Sports Information Department on July 1.
