Alumni Spotlight
Jeff Westcott ’84
Major: Accounting
Occupation: Special Agent, FBI
Concetta (Smith) Westcott ’85
Major: Accounting
Occupation: Part-time Accountant, full-time Mom
Who says nothing interesting ever happens in accounting class? For Jeff and Concetta Westcott, it was about more than debits and credits—it was the beginning of a friendship that would span several years and several thousand miles, and would eventually lead to marriage.
But wedding bells were the furthest things from their minds when they first met in Becky Rhoades’s Cost Accounting class in the spring of 1983. Concetta had two years left before graduation, and Jeff was looking forward to that summer’s Concert Band tour of Europe, which remains the highlight of his Evangel experience.
“I’ll never forget visiting the churches in Paris and Rome,” Jeff says, “and singing ‘The Greatest Thing in All My Life’ with their congregations. The Spirit really did transcend all the language and cultural barriers.”
Though the next two semesters brought more classes together—and late-night study sessions in Burgess Hall—both Jeff and Concetta thought it was good-bye when he graduated in May 1984 and accepted a job in Rochester, New York, with the CPA firm Arthur Andersen & Company.
But they managed to keep their friendship alive through letters, long-distance phone calls, and American Airlines, and by the time Jeff popped the question in December 1985, Concetta was more than ready to leave her position with a St. Louis-area CPA firm and move to the Northeast.
They got married in May 1986 and settled in Rochester. Concetta eventually landed a position as controller of a local firm, but Jeff was getting restless with his chosen profession. After holding several more accounting positions—which provided more responsibility and higher pay, but little in the way of excitement—Jeff undertook a major career change and applied for a job with the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He was sworn in as a Special Agent in August 1991 and has been assigned to the FBI’s Jacksonville, Florida, field office since that time. He has spent the majority of his career putting white-collar criminals and dirty politicians in jail, but has also solved bank robberies, chased fugitives through swamps, tracked terrorists, and served as a member of the SWAT team.
For the past two years Jeff has been in charge of the recruiting and hiring of new Special Agents throughout the field office’s territory. Additionally, as media coordinator, he serves as the Bureau’s spokesman for an area which covers all of North Central Florida and the Panhandle. He has appeared on Court TV’s Masterminds program and several times on local television news broadcasts. An article he authored on the FBI’s Super Bowl security efforts ran as the cover story in the January 2006 issue of the Law Enforcement Bulletin.
Unlike Jeff, Concetta still enjoys the challenges of a good accounting problem, and she gets the opportunity to exercise those skills on a part-time basis for the environmental consulting firm she’s been with for the last 14 years. Her most rewarding work, however, comes in caring for their two daughters, Rachel, 11, and Sarah, 7. Concetta is active in the PTAs at both girls’ schools, and plans on home-schooling Rachel next year.
The Westcotts attend Christ the Redeemer Church in Ponte Vedra Beach, where they are active in the music ministry.
Jeff and Concetta are truly thankful for the time they spent at Evangel. “And not just because it brought us together,” Concetta adds. “The concepts we learned there, like integrating faith and learning, built on values our parents had already instilled in us.”
The impact of the whole Evangel experience was made real once again when they attended EU’s 50th Anniversary Homecoming last October. “Just being on campus again, going to the chapel services, and seeing so many familiar faces,” Concetta says, “reminded us of how fortunate we are to have Evangel as part of our heritage. Those are our roots.”