McManus honored as outstanding alumni

Published 6:00 am Sunday, January 31, 2016

AUBURN, Ala. — Ten accomplished professionals who earned degrees from Auburn University’s College of Agriculture have been selected as recipients of the college’s 2016 Outstanding Alumni Awards.

The awards will be presented in a ceremony Wednesday at the Auburn Alumni Center.

Among the honorees is Jeff McManus with the department of horticulture, a 1988 graduate.

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By the time he was hired as director of Landscape, Airport and Golf Operations at the University of Mississippi in 2000, McManus had made a name for himself as a masterful landscaper at two luxury resorts in Florida.

At Ole Miss, he has transformed the 1,500-acre campus in Oxford into one of the best-landscaped public properties in the U.S. He is a noted speaker and trainer on leadership development and has two books, “Prune Like a Pro” and, forthcoming, “Growing Landscape Weeders to Leaders.”