Jonnie Perez came from Stanford to USF to serve as MD Admissions Director. He's a former pro soccer player.

Eight years ago, the day that Tampa’s only Major League Soccer team, the Tampa Bay Mutiny, folded in 2001 seemed to have little connection to the USF College of Medicine.

But fate works in strange ways, and the collapse of the Mutiny set in motion the events that led soccer midfielder Jonnie Perez, who tried out for the professional soccer team, to a different career -- and, this summer, to become the Director of MD Admissions for the USF College of Medicine.

USF persuaded Perez to leave the Stanford University School of Medicine, where he spent six years as assistant director of admissions before returning to Tampa Bay.

“It was a tough decision, but there’s so much potential here,” said Perez, 39. “I envisioned myself being at Stanford for 20 years. But when this came along, it was one of these once-in-a-lifetime opportunities.”

So Perez and his wife, Jessica, their 8-year-old daughter Alya and dog Sasha packed their bags for Tampa. They have fond memories of Tampa: Alya was born at Tampa General.

“Knowing there are leaders like Dr. Klasko, Dr. Monroe, who I could come here and be mentored by” helped tip the balance in USF’s favor, he said.

Perez grew up in Tucson and Indiana, spent some time in the Army and played pro soccer in the USL for the LA Fireballs and the Tucson Amigos, teams in the developmental league for Major League Soccer. He trained in Brazil at the Bauru Futbol Athletic Club. But he also completed his undergraduate and graduate at Indiana University, and was close to an MPH when he got a chance to try out for the Mutiny.

After Perez’s soccer dreams died, he moved to non-profit work, working for the Boys’ and Girls’ Clubs as the Director of Individual Services before going to the University of Evansville to work as an Admissions and Outreach Counselor. From there he moved to Stanford. While at Stanford, Perez was involved in establishing a set of best practices for admissions, managing the paperless Medical School Admissions (MESA) web base application, as well as recruiting, marketing, advising, leading admissions student activities, and other duties.

Perez chats with incoming students at a diversity session he helped facilitate.

Now that he’s at USF, Perez plans to enhance the best practices standards for admissions and build a web-based application.

He also thinks that USF’s curriculum will help attract prospective students, with its scholarly concentrations program, interdisciplinary curriculum, renowned faculty, diverse student and patient population and technologically advanced hospital and clinics as well as such new projects at the Lehigh Valley campus.

“We have a fantastic curriculum here,” he said. “It’s evolving in such a distinguished way.”

Of course, with 3,000 applicants for each class of 120 students, USF gets to choose the students that will be the best fit. Perez tries to work with those many applicants by “being a motivator and a realist at the same time,” he said.

The ultimate decisions involve more than just who has the highest GPA or MCAT score, he said.

“We’re looking for students in Florida and nationwide who have strong accomplishments outside the classroom through clinical, leadership, humanism, research, innovation and service experiences,” Perez said.

He’s happy to see applicants from prestigious schools, but he tries to keep his eyes open to see the potential in applicants from elsewhere as well.

“You can’t underestimate the schools that don’t have big names,” he said. “Everyone deserves a chance to have that opportunity – there are always diamonds out there that you have to search for at all schools.”

Perez is looking for new opportunities himself at USF. Although he has completed a Graduate Certificate in Health Studies, he plans to complete his MPH here at USF Health and then pursue a PhD in public health with a focus on rural and international health disparities. He’s optimistic that he can do that and reach his goals for the future of the admissions process.

“Being a dreamer, a visionary… if you think about creating it, it can happen,” he said. “I really believe that.”

Story by Lisa Greene, USF Health Communications
Photo by Eric Younghans, USF Health Communications