As Iowa State says goodbye to members of the Jischke administration, it’s nice to see one of the most intricate members of his administration decide to stick around for next year.

Tom Mitchell, president of the ISU Foundation, announced last week he will be staying at Iowa State in the coming year.

He had been nominated for a similar fund-raising position at the University of Washington in Seattle, but he will be keeping his talents at Iowa State.

Walk around campus and check out some of our latest buildings, projects or research efforts, and it’s easy to see how Mitchell has contributed to the ISU community.

It’s not easy to get people to give away their money, but our students have a new aerospace engineering building thanks to Mitchell’s efforts.

At a time when the state legislature keeps pressing the subtract button to figure out our budget, it’s very important to have a resource who can help add to what’s being lost.

Mitchell is that resource, and it would be a very long, expensive process to find someone of his caliber, if we needed a replacement.

Keeping our talent in university administration is also very important as our new president, Gregory Geoffroy, comes into office.

While Geoffroy will have his own way of doing things, it’s important to have at least a few people around who know the ropes and can help get the new gears going.

So thanks for sticking with us, Mr. Mitchell. We’re glad to have you here.

editorialboard: Carrie Tett, Jocelyn Marcus, Katie Goldsmith, Andrea Hauser and Tim Paluch