Jerry Junkins Elementary School

Jerry R. Junkins, born in 1937, was raised in a small Iowa community. He was salutatorian of his high school class of 25 students, bested only by Sally Schevers, who later would become his wife.

In 1959, Junkins received a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Iowa State University and headed to Dallas. Over the next nine years, while beginning to establish himself at Texas Instruments, Junkins would earn his master’s degree in engineering management from Southern Methodist University. Later in his career, he was awarded an honorary doctorate from Rensselaer Polytech Institute.

At Texas Instruments, Junkins started as a manufacturing engineer in the defense division, then managed all of the company’s defense business from 1975 to 1981. He was promoted in 1985 to president and CEO and in 1988 was given added responsibilities as chairman. Junkins re-engineered the corporate strategy, implementing a teaming structure. Under his direction, TI worked to build economic opportunities in Dallas and grew a minority business development program to more than $150 million in minority- and women-owned business contracts.

Junkins contributed extensively to the overall growth of industry. He served on the board of directors for 3M, Caterpillar Inc., and Proctor & Gamble Company. He was a board member of the Dallas Citizens Council and the US-Japan Business Council and served as a presidential appointee to the Advisory Committee on Trade Policy and Negotiations. He was chairman of the Business Roundtable’s International Trade and Investment Task Force and also chaired the alliance to secure congressional passage of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, an international free-trade legislation.

Friends of Junkins say his biggest passion was improving education, pointing out that he utilized TI’s influence to help create model Head Start programs in DISD. As chairman of the Citizens Council Education Committee, he fought for education reform in Texas schools by promoting measurement and accountability in the classroom. In 1995, Junkins was recognized for his work in early childhood education with the John B. Connally Award from the Just for the Kids Foundation.

Jerry R. Junkins died in 1996. His influence and impact on public education in Dallas continues today with the naming of a new DISD elementary school in his memory. Junkins is survived by his wife Sally, two daughters, a son-in-law, and a granddaughter.

t the time of Junkins’ death, then Texas Governor George W. Bush honored him with these words: “Jerry Junkins was not only a visionary businessman, but also a great humanitarian who believed that every child in Texas can learn, and he put the resources of his company to work to improve our public schools.”