Born on November 30, 1937, in Idaho, Veldon Lane Rawlins began his college education at Idaho State University and after serving a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Australia he transferred to Brigham Young University about the same time he married his wife Mary Jo Love.
[1] He is remembered for a strategic plan developed by faculty that led to increases in research funding and to growth in the numbers of talented students choosing WSU.
[citation needed] Rawlins is a labor economist by training and much of his research work focused on the effects of education on earnings in people's lives.
His books include "Public Service Employment: The Experience of a Decade," co-authored with Robert F. Cook and Charles F. Adams, published in 1985.
[citation needed] On April 16, 2010, the University of North Texas System Board of Regents appointed V. Lane Rawlins as UNT's president for the 2010-11 academic year.