Dr. Rob Jones leads the University of Missouri Extension as its director of Integrated Marketing Communications. As director, he oversees all marketing, communications, branding and web efforts for MU Extension. Under his leadership, MU Extension has shifted towards an integrated, user-centered approach to storytelling and communications. This means, for example, centering content around the goals and needs of target audiences and thinking strategically about which content, channels and formats best meet those needs.

Prior to MU Extension, Rob served as the founding director of the Missouri Education Business Incubator at the MU College of Education and Human Development, where he created go-to-market (commercialization) strategies for faculty members’ intellectual property. He was also the communications director for Ed.Xtraordinary, an ed-tech innovation wing at Teach For America (TFA), where he created and executed the strategic communications and programming vision for the unit. His career began as a middle school English teacher while serving as a corps member at TFA.

Rob earned his doctoral degree from the Missouri School of Journalism (‘20), where his award-winning research focused on digital brand strategy and brand management. He also earned his M.Ed. from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and his bachelor’s degree in communication from Truman State University.