Business North Carolina May 2022

SENIORS FLOCKING TO STATE HEAT UPHOSPITAL HOUSINGISMARKET AND THE STATE’S TOP-RANKED ...

DETAILING MR. ROGERS N.C. HIGHER TACKLES ED ECU’S SECTOR CHALLENGES • MEGASITE• ONLINE STRATEGY SELLERS PAYS GRAB OFF • UNC’S SOME $10 SPACE BILLION • BOOM ENDOWMENT RINGS TRIADFUND

Abundant ambition

MAY 2022 Price: $3.95 businessnc.com

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Already the nation’s largest historically Black university, N.C. A&T is banking on Professor Jianmei Yu and swelling corporate support to join higher education’s research elite.

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+ DEPARTMENTS 4 UP FRONT 6 POINT TAKEN: EXPORT EXPERTISE

MAY 2022

N.C. companies are targeting markets from Mexico to Morocco, aided by lots of wise counsel.

12 NC TREND N.C.’s megasite strategy pays off; Entrepreneur provides a platform for athletes to share their inner thoughts; Mitch Purgason is stitching for the stars; What you missed from the N.C. Tribune.

76 GREEN SHOOTS Mountain-area tech training program is paving a positive path in rural North Carolina.

+ SPONSORED SECTIONS 24 ROUND TABLE: LIFE SCIENCES A panel of industry experts and leaders discuss N.C. biomanufacturing’s massive impact and potential.

COVER STORY

AGGIE ACCELERATION

The nation’s biggest HBCU is on pace for recognition as a top research-level campus, aided by veteran leader Harold Martin Sr.

BY EDWARD MARTIN

HIGHER EDUCATION

Our annual look at enrollment and admissions data. And a report on the UNC System’s $10 billion endowment.

BY PETE M. ANDERSON

68 COMMUNITY CLOSE UP: WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA Infrastructure improvements, community investments and better career options boost the appeal of the state’s mountain counties.

GRAY POWER

Retirement living is attracting newcomers and large investments from various housing groups.

BY SHANNON CUTHRELL

May 2022, Vol. 42, No. 5 (ISSN 0279-4276). Business North Carolina is published monthly by Business North Carolina at 1230 West Morehead Street, Suite 308 Charlotte, NC 28208.

Telephone: 704-523-6987. Fax: 704-523-4211. All contents copyright © by Old North State Magazines LLC. Subscription rate: 1 year, $30. For change of address, send mailing label and allow six to eight weeks. Periodicals postage paid at Charlotte, NC, and additional offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to BUSINESS NORTH CAROLINA, 1230 West Morehead Street, Suite 308 Charlotte, NC 28208 or email circulation@businessnc.com.

Start your day with business news from across the state, direct to your inbox.

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UPFRONT

Ben Kinney V O L U M E 4 2 , N O. 5 PUBLISHER

Ben Kinney

bkinney@businessnc.com EDITOR

David Mildenberg

dmildenberg@businessnc.com ASSOCIATE EDITORS

Jennings Cool

jcool@businessnc.com

Colin Campbell

ccampbell@businessnc.com

Cathy Martin

cmartin@businessnc.com SENIOR CONTRIBUTING EDITOR

Edward Martin

emartin@businessnc.com

BEAUTIFUL NEW DAY

W

e are really in the throes of spring, as I write this. When I was younger, I wasn’t a big fan of the season. I dreaded the fine sheen of pollen that covered my car and created what looked like an alien loogie on my windshield when it mixed with the morning dew. I’d clear it away with my wipers, cursing as my eyes watered up in preparation for a major sneeze that was inevitably followed up by five or six more. The grand finale was a runny nose on the way to work each spring morning.

Seriously, that's how I used to think about spring: a nuisance.

I’ve changed my tune. I don’t know if I look at things differently as I get older or perhaps I became more aware of my immediate surroundings during the pandemic, but I like spring. My backyard is looking really nice with new grass, baby birds singing and hostas popping up all over.

Spring is about rebirth, life and well … hope. I used to be a big fall fan and I still am, but frankly, it’s not a hopeful time. It’s more about harvest, stocking up and preparing for winter (aka death). In spring, it’s more about looking forward to the next phase rather than dreading it.

I was thinking all this as our family gathered together on our back porch to watch the final day of the Masters, enjoying the great weather and each other’s company. Yes, we still have pollen to

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deal with, but spring rains wash it away, eventually. I hope you have some time to enjoy spring this weekend.

SPECIAL PROJECTS EDITOR

Pete M. Anderson

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS

Shannon Cuthrell, Ebony Morman, Michael J. Solender CREATIVE MANAGER

Peggy Knaack

pknaack@businessnc.com ART DIRECTOR

Here are a few lyrics from ELO’s 1977 song “Mr. Blue Sky” that sums things up: Sun is shinin' in the sky There ain't a cloud in sight It's stopped rainin' everybody's in the play And don't you know It's a beautiful new day, hey hey **** Our magazine has long understood the essential value of our state’s diverse system of higher education. This month’s edition includes our annual listing of statistics from dozens of campuses, along with features on N.C. A&T State University in Greensboro, Salem Academy and College in Winston-Salem and the $10 billion UNC Investment Fund. We appreciate contributors Edward Martin, Ebony L. Morman and Pete Anderson for aiding this report.

Ralph Voltz

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER

Alex Cason

MARKETING COORDINATOR

Jennifer Ware

jware@businessnc.com

ADVERTISING SALES ACCOUNT DIRECTOR

Melanie Weaver Lynch, eastern N.C. 919-855-9380 mweaver@businessnc.com

ACCOUNT MANAGER AND AUDIENCE DEVELOPMENT SPECIALIST

Scott Leonard, western N.C. 704-996-6426 sleonard@businessnc.com

CIRCULATION: 818-286-3106 EDITORIAL: 704-523-6987 REPRINTS: circulation@businessnc.com

BUSINESSNC.COM OWNERS

Jack Andrews, Frank Daniels Jr., Frank Daniels III, Lee Dirks, David Woronoff PUBLISHED BY

Contact Ben Kinney at bkinney@businessnc.com.

Old North State Magazines LLC PRESIDENT

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POINTTAKEN

Dan Barkin

EXPORT EXPERTISE N.C. companies are finding new markets from Mexico to Morocco, aided by lots of wise counsel.

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f you want to learn how to export your products or services to foreign countries, call Mike Hubbard and John Loyack of the Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina. They know the ins and outs of exporting and so do their folks.

And it would help to take a class, like the ones EDPNC offers. This is not a casual suggestion. Don’t wing it.

There are reasons to export goods: new markets, jobs for North Carolinians, sales that can keep you going when in a slump.

But it’s complicated. That’s why a lot of small businesses don’t do it. North Carolina exported $33.45 billion in goods last year (up 17.5% from $28.46 in 2020) and an estimated $12 billion in services, according to a recent WISERTrade services estimate. Our state’s GDP is about $660 billion annually; our exports have room to grow.

I talked about this with Hubbard and Loyack, but before I get to them, you should hear from some folks who export goods. Their stories may encourage you. Nobody starts out as an expert.

‘What the hell do we do?’

Jonathan Szucs, general manager of Advanced Superabrasives Inc., certainly didn’t jump in knowing everything.

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ASI is a 40-employee company based in the small Madison County town of Mars Hill, north of Asheville. Like many firms, ASI, which makes grinding wheels for a range of industries, got into exporting when it received an order out of the blue. One of ASI’s wheels was included in a shipment that one of its customers sent to a foreign client.

“And they saw the company name and they looked us up, and they said, ‘Hey, we’ve got this wheel and we would like to buy another one,’” recalls Szucs. “And we were like, ‘We don’t know anything about shipping or selling to Canada or Mexico. What the hell do we do?’”

“And so, at the beginning, we made a lot of mistakes. We didn’t know anything about customs compliance. What are HS codes? What are the duties?”

ASI got ahold of the U.S. Department of Commerce office in Charlotte, which put the company in contact with the state’s international trade folks, then in the N.C. Department of Commerce, now in the EDPNC. But from this accidental start, ASI began getting serious about exporting. It was a matter of survival.

ASI was founded in 1993 by Szucs’ father, Attila, to supply grinding wheels for the tools used in woodworking, such as in North Carolina’s furniture industry. By the early 2000s, a lot of ASI’s customers were out of business when foreign

PHOTOS COURTESY OF ASI

▲ Jonathan Szucs literally grinds away at Advanced Superabrasives, the Mars Hill manufacturer started by his father in 1993 .

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companies, particularly in China, began to dominate furniture. The recession in 2008-09 compounded the company’s problems.

“We were decimated,” says Szucs. “We lost 30% of our workforce. We were on reduced hours. It was horrific.”

In 2008, ASI decided to expand into aerospace, medical, automotive and energy. “We’re going to get into everything.”

And equally important, the company decided to really learn how to export — not only to grow revenues — but also to sell in countries with different business cycles.

did the previous 15 years combined,” says Szucs.

“When countries see that you spent the resources to create a website that says ASIWheels.mx — which is not dot.com and a cheap translation — they start taking notice of your company. My distributor down there told me he went from cold calling to getting 10 requests for quotes a week.”

Here are three things Szucs has learned selling in 28 countries: ■ Overseas, American products are respected. His foreign customers will display empty ASI crates “because it says ‘Made in USA.’” U.S. manufacturers are faster and more flexible than many overseas competitors.

■ When he gives a foreign customer 30-day terms, they often pay early. “They want your product. They’re not going to mess with that.”

■ Banks appreciate exporters in large part because they have a more diverse customer base.

‘We’re going to jail’

▲ Advanced Superabrasives exports to 28 countries.

One key decision was to tap government expertise.

Boosting exports is a high priority in the federal government and among the states. Szucs got help on market research from state trade experts. The Small Business and Technology Development Center, which has offices at UNC System campuses, helped him with an export plan. And he took advantage of the U.S. Commerce Department’s RAISE program, designed for rural exporters trying to figure out where to go next.

A breakthrough came from the State Trade Expansion Program (STEP). Talk to small business exporters and they will mention the federally funded, state-administered STEP, which helps pay for nice websites, foreign trade-show costs and other expenses.

After ASI used a STEP grant to create a Mexican website and social-media marketing program tailored to that country, business exploded. “We did more revenue last year than we

South of Asheville, about 40 minutes down Interstate 26 from ASI, Julie Detmering manages exports at Equilibar, a Fletcher-based company that manufactures equipment that regulates the flow and pressure of fluids for a variety of industrial applications.

Fifteen years ago, the 35-employee company was a startup, and Detmering was one of the first employees. Even as a young company, it was developing an international reputation for its custom products, but it had limited knowledge of the documentation required.

Then she went to a class sponsored by the state, and, to put it mildly, it was a revelation.

“I actually called here on my break from that conference and told them to stop what they were doing. Like, ‘Don’t ship anything,’ I said. ‘I think we’re all going to jail.’”

At the conference, Detmering had just learned that exporters are supposed to make sure they aren’t sending products to “denied parties.” “Basically it’s embargoed countries, drug traffickers, people that Interpol is looking for. People that you’re not allowed to ship to.”

In other words, you don’t want the FBI showing up wanting to know why your product was on CNN last night in Iran.

Today, Equilibar gets half its business from exporting, a record level. The company has shipped to 70 countries, including 39 last year.

Countries have their own trade quirks and their own forms.

Occasionally, Detmering gets stumped by a customer in some country asking for a form she’s never heard of.

A challenge every small business faces is getting paid.

Because the federal government wants to promote exports, businesses can buy insurance for their receivables. “We have confidence that no matter what happens, we will get 95%,” says Detmering. “The U.S. government goes after that company for the money. That’s been able to help us accept business from a lot of companies that we’re just not sure of.”

The state’s perspective

Now back to EDPNC’s Mike Hubbard and John Loyack.

Hubbard is director of international trade and joined EDPNC in 2014. Loyack is EDPNC’s vice president of global business services.

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POINTTAKEN

Dan Barkin

Top markets for N.C. exports

Top N.C. export products

Canada $6.5 billion

Pharmaceuticals $6.4 billion

Mexico $4.6 billion

Industrial machinery, including computers $4.89 billion

China $4.1 billion

Electric machinery and parts $2.97 billion

France $1.4 billion

Miscellaneous chemical products $1.71 billion

Singapore $1 billion

Plastics $1.63 billion

Netherlands $949 million

Precious stones, metals $1.26 billion

Japan $ 944 million

Optic or medical instruments $1.17 billion

Germany $ 873 million

Aircraft, spacecraft and parts $1.06 billion

United Kingdom $ 855 million

Vehicles and parts $902.37 million

Honduras $ 812 million

Wood pulp, paper and paperboard $895.66 million

source: Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina

“It starts with a sit-down with us,” Loyack says. They can help with a market assessment. They can help you develop an export plan. They can make introductions at the Small Business Administration, Ex-Im Bank or the ports.

“What we need in return,” he says, “is someone who is going to follow up on the steps we provide. We’ll come to you with that market assessment and a list of legitimate partners, but you’re going to have to follow up on that.”

“We’ll work with them,” says Hubbard, “to figure out which country you should go to.”

Free trade helps

There are a lot of potential countries, an astonishing number of markets.

Much of what North Carolina exports goes to Canada ($6.54 billion in 2021), Mexico ($4.56 billion) and China ($4.08 billion). But our pharmaceuticals, chemicals, machines and agricultural commodities go everywhere.

Therafirm, a 100-employee company that manufactures medical-grade compression stockings in Hamlet, sells in 53 countries. The U.S. has free-trade agreements with 20 countries. “I can’t express enough how those free-trade agreements have helped us grow our business,” says Michelle Byrne, who manages Therafirm’s exports.

One agreement is in North Africa.

When I talked with Hubbard and Loyack, I asked what’s a hot export market where North Carolina could do more business? Loyack didn’t hesitate: “Morocco is exactly that.”

“So, the free-trade agreement goes back to 2006, but U.S. manufacturers don’t really take advantage of it. Now, Morocco is considered the Mexico of Europe. There’s massive — and Mike has been there to see these — massive automotive plants.” ■

Veteran journalist Dan Barkin went to high school in Newton, Mass., arrived in the South for college in 1971 and moved to North Carolina in 1996. He can be reached at dbarkin53@gmail.com.

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ADVANCING BLACK ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN NORTH CAROLINA

Launched in February 2022, the PNC North Carolina HBCU Initiative is helping cultivate entrepreneurship resources and opportunities for students at five local universities through grant funding from the PNC Foundation.

This is the eighteenth in a series of informative monthly articles for North Carolina businesses from PNC in collaboration with BUSINESS NORTH CAROLINA magazine.

When historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) were first established in the years following the Civil War, they represented a singular pathway to higher education for Black students. Today, the value proposition of the more than 100 HBCUs nationwide is defined by much more than access. These institutions are integral to the creation of jobs, economic development opportunities and vibrant communities – a premise that is especially true in North Carolina, which holds the distinction as the state with the highest enrollment of Black HBCU undergraduate students.

“At PNC, we recognize how important HBCUs are to our state’s success,” says Weston Andress, PNC regional president for Western Carolinas. “HBCU graduates contribute significantly to the talent pipeline that is fueling North Carolina’s economy, and these universities are foundational to shaping the workforce North Carolina needs to remain competitive in business.”

To characterize the local economic impact of North Carolina’s HBCUs, Lori Jones Gibbs, PNC Community Development Banking market manager for the Carolinas, points to the landmark study, HBCUs Make America Strong: The Positive Economic Impact of Historically Black Colleges and Universities, produced by the Frederick D. Patterson Research Institute of UNCF (United Negro College Fund), which offers the following statistics: • Together, North Carolina HBCUs generate $1.7 billion in total economic impact.

• Every dollar in initial spending by North Carolina HBCUs generates $1.42 in spending for local and regional economies.

• North Carolina HBCUs generate 15,563 jobs for local and regional economies.

• Graduates of North Carolina HBCUs can expect to earn 61% more over their lifetimes than they would without their college degrees.

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“There’s no question HBCUs play an essential role in developing Black business leaders and fostering wealth creation in Black communities,” says Jones Gibbs.

“Furthermore, these schools are uniquely positioned to help advance Black entrepreneurship and economic empowerment.”

To enrich the future of entrepreneurship and create workforce opportunities, PNC launched the PNC North Carolina HBCU Initiative in February 2022. Central to this effort is the distribution of more than $2 million in grant funding from the PNC Foundation, which will be awarded over a three-year period to help fund the development and delivery of entrepreneurship resources and programming for students at Elizabeth City State University, Fayetteville State University, Johnson C. Smith University, North Carolina Central University and Winston-Salem State University.

The PNC North Carolina HBCU Initiative is empowering these institutions to enhance their respective entrepreneurship curricula and offerings – from the introduction of new programs, to capacity-building opportunities, to technology enhancements. Additionally, students from all five schools will have the opportunity to participate in the PNC Pitch Competition, an annual forum where student-entrepreneurs can showcase innovative ideas and demonstrate their marketing skills.

The PNC North Carolina HBCU Initiative will come to life at each of the five grantee institutions in the following ways: •

Johnson C. Smith University is launching the PNC Entrepreneurship Hub, providing selected studententrepreneurs with incubator space to develop and launch new businesses. The hub will equip these PNC Fellows with access to technology, seed funding and mentorship to help them launch new businesses, or take existing ones to the next level.

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•

Winston-Salem State University will develop the PNC Entrepreneurial Fellows Program, helping selected student fellows learn critical aspects of creating a new venture by participating in nationally certified programs, workshops, research and one-on-one mentoring with successful North Carolina entrepreneurs.

•

Elizabeth City State University will expand its Entrepreneur Lab, which offers resources and development opportunities for students interested in launching and marketing a business. The funding also has established the PNC Entrepreneurship Fellow Program and supported PNC Viking Entrepreneurship Week, which was held April 4-9.

•

Fayetteville State University will build out its Entrepreneurship Lab (E-Lab), an action learning opportunity designed to help students accelerate new ideas and product development. Student entrepreneur

teams creating or growing their own ventures may compete for E-Lab funding. The E-Lab will also offer business and economic development support for community members and foster self-employment opportunities.

•

North Carolina Central University will establish a Center for Entrepreneurship and Economic Development. This program will provide student fellows with entrepreneurial and community economic development education and comprehensive small business finance training, and encourage them to become community development investors.

“PNC shares with these institutions a vision for advancing inclusive entrepreneurship education and opportunities,” says Jim Hansen, PNC regional president for Eastern Carolinas.

“We look forward to joining student-entrepreneurs and their campus communities on this meaningful, three-year journey.”

For more information, please visit www.pnc.com.

REGIONAL PRESIDENTS: Weston Andress, Western Carolinas: (704) 643-5581 Jim Hansen, Eastern Carolinas: (919) 835-0135

“PNC” is a registered mark of The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc. ©2022 The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Manufacturing

Manufacturing Entrepreneurship Fashion Public affairs Statewide

FAST DISAPPEARING Slow to the megasite game, North Carolina became a hotspot for big manufacturers over the past year.

By Edward Martin

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orth Carolina’s landmark economic development victory is among the world’s biggest megasites: The 7,000-acre Research Triangle Park that was created in the 1950s and 1960s.

So one might suspect the state would be a leader in megasite development. Nope.

Perhaps because of RTP’s success and the long-prevailing attitude that North Carolina had sufficient attributes, the state was relatively slow to create a variety of sites of 1,000 to 2,000 acres that could attract major manufacturing operations. There was also a money component, of course. Developing megasites can entail hundreds of millions of dollars of investment in land and infrastructure.

Meanwhile, rival Southern states with aggressive stances persuaded a series of Fortune 500 and global companies to place assembly plants employing thousands of workers on vast tracts of land over the past 20 years.

North Carolina’s approach shifted in the past decade as state officials and lawmakers worked with private developers to organize megasites stretching across the state’s eastern and

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central regions. Now four sites have been taken off the table in the past 18 months, including two clearly defined megasites and two other major projects.

■ At the Greensboro-Randolph Megasite, Toyota Motor Corp. plans a 1,750-employee, $1.3 billion, electricvehicle battery plant. It is expected to open in 2025.

■ At the Triangle Innovation Point megasite near Moncure in Chatham County, Vietnam’s VinFast says it will invest as much as $2 billion and employ 7,500 at an electric-vehicle factory. Construction is expected to start later this year.

■ At Piedmont Triad International Airport in Guilford County, a 1,000-acre tract helped attract Coloradobased Boom Supersonic, which pledges a $500 million plant to build aircraft by 2025, employing as many as 2,400 by 2030.

■ At The Grounds in Concord, Austrian energy-drink giant Red Bull and drugmaker Eli Lilly are splitting a 2,000-acre site formerly occupied by Philip Morris, the cigarette maker. Lilly says it will employ 600 and invest $1 billion, while Red Bull is investing $740 million and plans a workforce of 400.

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“The megasite strategy has clearly been validated,” says Chris Chung, CEO of the Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina, the state’s primary industry recruiter.

“There’s always going to be somebody — automotive, aerospace, pharmaceuticals, superconductors — looking for a large tract with super connectivity. If you don’t have a megasite, you’re not going to be in that conversation long, despite our great business climate.”

Megasites became a major trend about 30 years ago, often sparking public skepticism about the cost and commitment of assembling massive, speculative tracts of land without commitment from an industry. But they have become critical for states as companies set timetables, usually ranging from 18 months to 24 months, from the conception of a plant to actual production.

The sites generally have 1,000 acres or more and shovelready infrastructure. Bonuses are rail, ocean or interstatehighway transportation and available nearby workers.

The state still has some solid megasite offerings. Perhaps the most high-profile is the 1,800-acre Chatham-Siler City Advanced Manufacturing megasite. Located about 15 miles from the future Toyota plant, it is owned by Greensboro businessmen Tim Booras and D.H. Griffin. Chatham Economic Development Corp. and Samet Corp., the Greensboro-based contractor led by Arthur Samet, are marketing the project.

Other megasites include the Mid-Atlantic Industrial Rail Park near Wilmington, with more than 1,100 acres; the Person County megasite with 1,300 acres about 50 miles north of Raleigh; and the 1,040-acre International Logistics Park in Brunswick and Columbus counties, which is owned by people affiliated with Wilmington-based Cameron Management.

There’s also the 1,449-acre Kingsboro CSX Select megasite east of Rocky Mount, which has had a tumultuous history. In 2017, China’s Triangle Tyre said it would invest $580 million in a plant employing 800 people there, but those plans have stalled amid trade tensions between the U.S. and China.

Then, last December, a fire at the QVC distribution center, which was one of Kingsboro’s first tenants, forced a closing that put more than 2,000 workers off the job. In April, the shopping channel said it wouldn’t rebuild at the Kingsboro site, dealing a blow to the local economy.

Norris Tolson, president of the Rocky Mount-based Carolinas Gateway Partnership, an economic development group, says he and others are negotiating with as many as 50 other potential tenants at Kingsboro. He acknowledges most are smaller than Triangle Tyre and QVC. Having such sites does not guarantee North Carolina will always win, of course. Intel Corp. looked at Triangle Innovation Point but is instead investing more than $20 billion in a semiconductor plant near Columbus, Ohio.

Startup Rivian Automotive considered N.C. sites but chose to invest in Georgia for other reasons. Rivian was deterred by a state law passed three years ago that blocks auto manufacturers from selling directly to consumers without a dealer network, various economic development officials say. The law

included a carve-out for Tesla, the pioneering electric-vehicle maker led by Elon Musk.

The idiosyncrasies of CEOs also play a factor in site selection, stresses Darrell Frye, chairman of the Randolph County Commission. He worked on developing the Greensboro-Randolph site.

“You know,” he says, “three years ago when Toyota-Mazda went to Alabama, it certainly wasn’t because of a lack of a site here in North Carolina or lack of preparation on our part.”

The first Mazdas and Toyotas began rolling out of a $2.3 billion, Huntsville, Alabama, plant last fall after the Japanese companies bypassed North Carolina.

“That plant went there because [Toyota Motor President] Akio Toyoda was a Boy Scout who went [to Alabama] when he was a kid,” says Frye. Toyoda has confirmed that story, noting it was his first extended trip away from Japan.

The state’s distribution of megasites noticeably excludes many of the regions west of the Piedmont Crescent, the heavily urbanized Interstate 85 corridor. Topography is the reason.

“If you’re talking about a thousand acres, a good chunk of which is to be developed for an industrial building, you’re simply limited by the scarcity of large, flat tracts of land,” Chung says. “Blowing the tops off mountains requires a huge resource of investments. That’s why when you get west of Interstate 77, you’re limited in what you can do.”

That factor doesn’t altogether zap major economic development developments, he adds. “Look at what Pratt & Whitney is doing in Asheville,” he says. Later this year, the Connecticutbased aerospace manufacturer expects to open a $650 million, 1.2 million-square-foot-plant on a 100-acre tract in Buncombe County. The company, which is owned by Raytheon Technologies, didn't require more land.

As for megasites, Chung says North Carolina’s success in landing the Toyota battery plant bodes well for the future.

“We’ve seen probably no less than a dozen and half of these deals, all thousand-plus jobs with billion-dollar-plus investments, cross our desks in the past couple of years, and we don’t see any signs of that letting up. Every one is potentially an opportunity for one of the state’s megasites.” With one caveat.

“Each company has a unique set of requirements,” he adds.

“You want to have more dogs in the hunt if possible.” ■

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Entrepreneurship

ANONYMOUS SOURCING David Chadwick's RealResponse provides a platform for athletes and staff to report what is really going on.

By Michael J. Solender

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▲UNC Charlotte Athletic Director Mike Hill praises David Chadwick's efforts.

RealResponse’s flagship product is the anonymous reporting platform in which student-athletes share concerns about various issues: academic and mental-health challenges, equipment or facility problems, travel concerns, and how they are getting along with coaches.

The comments are shared with administrators designated by university athletic directors. Many schools also route the reports to Title IX coordinators, who are responsible for discrimination and harassment issues. When things get serious, university attorneys and key administrators are also notified.

“The biggest plus for us is the tool provides a confidential platform for student-athletes to communicate about their experiences with the program,” says Mike Hill, UNC Charlotte’s athletic director.

While the university has many checks and balances, “The reality is when you have 450 student-athletes it’s impossible to know every student-athlete’s experience. It is important for us to provide a forum for that.”

Purpose driven

Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem was RealResponse’s first client in 2016. “David is a great example of a purpose-driven entrepreneur who built something of real value for student health, safety and welfare,” says Athletic Director John Currie, who knew about the business before coming to Winston-Salem in 2019.

“The tool has grown and exceeded my expectations. It’s easy for us to think our students will always tell us what they are thinking,

PHOTO BY ALEX CASON

eing associated with a university athletic scandal prompted David Chadwick to build a business around accountability and shifting an uneven power dynamic in collegiate sports.

In 2012, the former Charlotte Latin basketball star was on the Rice University basketball team in Houston. An Iranian-born player and a coach originally from Egypt allegedly received derogatory comments by coaches and administrators that led to racial discrimination. Rice officials denied any wrongdoing. The matter sparked negative stories in Sports Illustrated and other publications “I thought either [the alleged discrimination] wasn't going on and the school should have had more protection, or it was going on and they should have uncovered it and addressed it sooner,” says Chadwick, who later transferred to Valparaiso University in Indiana, where he earned a bachelor’s degree and an MBA. “I wanted to come up with something that would solve a direct challenge that I and many of my peers experienced: The absence of a confidential, real-time accessible way to bring issues forward to administrators and coaches.”

Three years later, Chadwick reworked his Valparaiso businessschool entrepreneurial class project for an anonymous online reporting platform and launched a business to create a fairer, simpler reporting system. Seven years later, RealResponse has signed more than 100 colleges and universities as clients and employs 10 staffers. The business has experienced torrid growth of late, signing partnerships with the NFL’s Denver Broncos and Kansas City Chiefs. Additional clients include the NFL Players Association, U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, The National Women’s Soccer League and USA Gymnastics.

Their tools provide more than 150,000 athletes and staff the ability to anonymously share feedback and allow administrators to create custom surveys, document cases and retain records through accessible software. The platform is mobile-friendly and allows clients to send texts to students on important matters ranging from COVID-19 protocols to reminders to complete a required survey.

“Student-athletes are oftentimes unlikely to speak up because of the [unbalanced] power dynamic,” says Chadwick. “They're dealing with potential repercussions of playing time, financial aid, desire to work in the sports industry, network and relationships. Having a confidential third-party [vehicle] allows them to address concerns when they might not have otherwise.”

Chadwick’s clients include UNC System campuses in Asheville, Boone, Charlotte, Greensboro, and Wilmington, along with Campbell, High Point, and Wake Forest universities and Davidson College. His father, David Chadwick Sr., is a former UNC Chapel Hill basketball player who has been one of Charlotte's best-known pastors for decades.

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but experience has shown that’s not always the case.”

When cheerleaders had concerns about food not being delivered after a game, the RealResponse system helped Wake Forest address the gap in planning promptly, Currie says.

A popular RealResponse feature is a season-end survey to gauge athletes’ attitudes and compare internally and with other schools. New NCAA rules allow unprecedented movement between universities through the “transfer portal” system, which is challenging coaches and schools to both retain and recruit talented performers.

Knowing what athletes think may be more critical than ever.

PHOTO COURTESY OF DAVID CHADWICK

▲ Chadwick played at Valparaiso in Indiana.

“We strongly encourage survey participation,” Hill says. “We get a lot of positive and complimentary feedback; it’s not always negative. This input allows us to help create the best possible environment and experience.”

UNC Asheville benefited from RealResponse when the pandemic led to fewer face-to-face meetings, creating some communications challenges, says Janet Cone, senior administrator for university enterprises and athletic director. “RealResponse made it so much easier for student-athletes to share feedback. We also have coaches use the tool to document meetings with athletes on various issues such as mental health or academic concerns.”

Chadwick views the business as an opportunity to address important personal needs of collegians. He cites a school where an athlete used the system to alert leaders that a teammate was considering suicide.

“Administrators were able to quickly intervene, hospitalize the student and get her resources to help,” he says. “The A.D. told me that they think, to this day, our system [was key] in the intervention. Learning this was gratifying.” ■ M A Y

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Fashion

WELL STITCHED Star athletes help a Charlotte apparel designer reach the winner’s circle after a slow start.

By Jennings Cool

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My parents did a great job encouraging all my siblings to pursue creative stuff. My mom was an actress. She did set design, and she now does interior design and real estate. Our house was just ridiculous. My mom would find antiques at old spots. Our house looked like a set design. I grew up in a really creative home — a really colorful home.

In college, I took a design class, which combined creativity, personal business and fun. My whole life, I figured I had to do banking or marketing. The art of design reframes your mind on how you think about products. But it reframed how I think about my life, by me saying, "Hey, I really could do something creative, and if I got good at it, I could make it a career."

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▲Carolina Panthers tackle Derrick Brown is a Purgason client.

I took an entrepreneurship class in college. We had to start a business. One of my buddies was in a program at Appalachian where they went to China and learned about supply chain. There was a tailor there that would tell people who went on the program that they could bring a couple hundred dollars for custom suits.

My friend told the tailor, "If you teach us how to do this, we will sew these suits back in the U.S." That’s how it started. We made custom suits for college kids as our project.

The first year [in 2015], I made $18,000. The second year, I made $20,000. The third year, I made, like, $23,000. Those years were not glory years — they were sleeping on couches, couldn’t afford rent, sleeping in my car. Each year that passed by, it got a little bit better. It was really year four when things started taking off. It was that year I got my first NFL client. It really exploded in year four and year five.

It is all really word-of-mouth. I have never made a cold call in my life, which is why it was a slow growth. But my philosophy on that is if I am good at what I do, it will speak for itself.

I want to know as much as I can about the client. I ask questions to help me understand their personality, their association with color and what they want to exude when they are wearing clothing.

In the past seven years, I see that people care less about Prada and Gucci, and they want to work with creative individuals. Though accidental, I could not have timed being a personal brand better. ■

PHOTOS COURTESY OF MITCH PURGASON

hile earning a bachelor’s degree at Appalachian State University, Mitch Purgason, 29, started a clothing design business for an entrepreneurship class with two fellow students. His friends moved on to other pursuits, but the Greensboro native’s itch for design never wavered.

His Charlotte-based Mitch Purgason custom clothing brand has produced more than 1,500 suits for a clientele that includes celebrities such as Carolina Panthers running back Christian McCaffrey, NASCAR driver Bubba Wallace, San Francisco 49ers tight end George Kittle and social-media influencer Gary Vaynerchuk.

The brand, which goes

by Stitched by Mitch on social media, contracts with apparel makers in New York, Los Angeles, India, Italy and Mexico to produce the threads. He works with eight tailors and two operations staffers, specializing in men’s suits that range from $2,500 to $20,000 depending on fabric, amount of work involved and other factors.

He also makes shirts and ▲Mitch Purgason bespoke leather jackets for women and men.

His suits feature a tricolor Milanese buttonhole, which conventional suit makers cannot duplicate, he says. For himself, Purgason prefers a wide peak lapel with a soft shoulder, as little construction as possible and a cashmere, silk blend. “It feels like a cloud and drapes wonderfully.”

Comments are edited for clarity and brevity.

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Public affairs Our paid daily newsletter launched in February, providing detailed interviews with key lawmakers, Q&As of other political leaders, and stories on redistricting and candidate filings for the 2022 elections.

Plus lots of stories tracking daily happenings at the state legislature.

Here’s some of what you missed. Sign up today at nctribune.com.

ELECTRIC BUS CHARGER PLANT HOSTS INFRASTRUCTURE TALKS

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ov. Roy Cooper, U.S. Rep. Deborah Ross and other business and political leaders stopped by the Siemens manufacturing facility in Wendell for an infrastructure event in April. One of the products Siemens produces there is charging equipment for electric buses — obviously a huge growth industry as the transportation sector shifts away from diesel and gas. The plant has quietly added 100 jobs in the past year and expects “hundreds more” in the coming years, an executive told the crowd.

meeting Cooper’s goals to get more zero-emissions vehicles on the road. GoTriangle CEO Charles Lattuca offered a prime example: Its fleet recently added two electric buses, but the buses can run the system’s regional routes for only half a day before they have to return to their chargers.

Among the other highlights from the Accelerating America’s Electric Future event, which was hosted by the Washington, D.C.based advocacy group United for Infrastructure: ■ Federal money coming: Ross highlighted the billions of dollars coming from Washington through the recent infrastructure bill, and she said a challenge is making sure local governments and organizations understand how to get their projects funded.

“It is up to members of Congress to continue to have these (grant) workshops to explain to people how they might access these funds,” she said, adding that the money will be released over the course of several years, giving more time to apply.

Ross is also optimistic that North Carolina will see additional resources from the Innovation and Competition Act. She expects the House and Senate will reach an agreement soon, and the bill will be signed into law by this summer.

▲ Gov. Roy Cooper, center, tours the Siemens manufacturing facility.

Siemens, a multinational company headquartered in Germany, has had the Wendell plant for decades, but it has scaled up its operations there and changed product lines in recent years.

Electric vehicle charging infrastructure will be a key piece of

PHOTO COURTESY OF OFFICE OF GOV. ROY COOPER

$203.5 million still left unspent as business grants offer another shot

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ith $203.5 million still left unspent, the state’s Business Recovery Grant program will reopen its application process on May 2 with a June 1 deadline.

Lawmakers adjusted the requirements for the program in the recently approved technical corrections bill. In the first round of grants, about 3,100 approved recipients were hospitality businesses, totaling $257.4 million.

But the other part of the program got less interest.

Only 282 non-hospitality businesses received “reimbursement” grants, totaling $22.3 million. That’s likely because those businesses were eligible to apply only if they hadn’t already benefited from another COVID-19 relief program, such as the Paycheck Protection

■ Duke’s plan coming soon: Duke Energy Executive Vice President Brian Savoy said the utility company is nearing the next required step from last year’s House Bill 951. He said the carbon reduction plan will be submitted to the N.C. Utilities Commission in mid-May. “The plan is aggressive and it’s the right one for North Carolina,” he said. “We’re going to provide many options for the Utilities Commission to consider.”

Program and Job Retention Grants.

Once the program restarts in May, non-hospitality businesses will be eligible even if they got other assistance. But the awards will be capped at 10% of COVID-19 economic losses, rather than 20% for businesses that didn’t receive previous assistance.

UNC construction over budget

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ike anyone else trying to build right now, the UNC System is facing labor shortages and supply-chain issues driving up costs. It’s coming at a time when the latest state budget kickstarts a large number of university building projects across the state.

Katherine Lynn, senior associate vice president for finance and capital planning, told a legislative

oversight committee that UNC’s smaller projects are running 40% over budget and larger projects are 20% over budget. She’s also having trouble filling staff positions to oversee construction projects.

“The surge in capital projects is being shouldered by the remaining staff,” Lynn said.

She asked lawmakers to take action in the short session that could reduce some of the hurdles the construction projects face.

The UNC System wants to increase the number of smaller projects that don’t require an informal bidding process by raising the cap that triggers the process. And it wants to shift oversight of projects valued between $2 million and $4 million from the State Construction Office to the UNC Board of Governors, which could speed up approvals.

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Statewide

We love getting feedback from our readers. Here’s a sampling of what you had to say about Business North Carolina on social media last month.

MFGCon

Quis Machinery Inc. MFGCON is one of our favorite events and we’re proud to be a sponsor again this year! Join us May 18-19.

The conference will feature the most upto-date and relevant topics from North Carolina’s most influential manufacturing thought leaders.

Podcast

Michelle Castelloe Still not used to hearing my voice on a podcast, but love telling the story of why I do what I do!

Business North Carolina On today’s podcast, Jennings Cool speaks with Michelle Castelloe, the owner of Moxie Mercantile and Betty by Moxie Mercantile. Castelloe talks to us about her business, some of the various products the store sells, the process of selecting and promoting vendors, her career journey, and more.

Say Cheese

qccheeseroyale Business North Carolina & SouthPark Magazines are running a great piece about #PimentoCheese, and we were lucky enough to join the fun. Grab your copy today!!! @businessnorthcarolina @ southparkmagazine

SCAN ME

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HEAVY METAL

ucor, the largest U.S. steel maker, plans a $350 million mill in Lexington, its first manufacturing expansion in North Carolina since the 2000 opening of its Hertford County plant. Unlike that remote location near Ahoskie in eastern North Carolina, the Davidson County site was chosen because it is 3 miles east of busy Interstate 85, which provides good access to scrap metal yards in Gastonia, Monroe and Whiteville, CEO Leon Topolian said. When Nucor opened the Hertford plant, it had annual revenue of $4 billion, compared with last year’s total of $36.5 billion.

The new site will produce rebar, a material to reinforce concrete for bridges, roads and buildings. It is being facilitated by as much as $19 million of state incentives, less than offers from South Carolina and Virginia.It is slated to open in 2025 with as many as 200 workers, who will receive estimated annual compensation of nearly $100,000.

That’s more than double the Davidson County average of $45,000.

The $350 million isn’t a big bet given Nucor’s momentum. Capital spending totaled $1.6 billion last year. In January, it announced a $2.7 billion sheet mill in Mason County, West Virginia, marking the largest construction project in company history. In February, it said it would spend $290 million to expand its mill in Crawfordsville, Indiana, and it bought a majority of California Steel Industries for $400 million.

Last year, Nucor reported pre-tax income of $10.3 billion, which compares with a total of nearly $12 billion during the four previous years combined.

Net income The previous annual record was 2021 $6.9 billion $4 billion in 2018.

The profits stem partly from 2020 $0.7 a surge in the spread between 2019 $1.3 what it costs to produce steel and how much Nucor charges.

2018 $2.3 That spread averaged about $380 per ton between 2012 and 2017, then increased to about Revenue $440 in 2018-19 and soared 2021 $36.5 billion to $726 last year, according to the company.

2020 $20.1 Topolian told the Charlotte 2019 $22.6 Business Journal that he’s looking at acquiring some N.C. 2018 $25.1 manufactures beyond Nucor’s source: Nucor core steel-making business.

“We’re not going to go into sock making,” he joked.

Charlotte-based Nucor shares have returned 222% in the past three years, including dividends, through mid-April. That is fourth-best among N.C.-based public companies, trailing Piedmont Lithium, Cornerstone Building Brands (which is being acquired by a PE firm), and Ingles Markets. The S&P 500 has gained 59% in that period. ■

NUCOR’S REBOUND

To find Business North Carolina online or go to linktr.ee/businessnorthcarolina.

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INNOVATION GAINS

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orth Carolina ranked 20th in the U.S. in innovation, according to a new study by the N.C. Board of Science, Technology & Innovation. It considers 39 measures of innovation capacity nationally. Previous studies ranked North Carolina as 21st in 2019, 23rd in 2017 and 2015, and 24th in 2013.

State officials say innovation determines how fast the N.C. economy will grow and whether the standard of living improves. Innovation depends on the quality of education, investment in research and development, and moving that R&D out of the labs and into markets. The report noted that the state’s high-paying technology and life-sciences jobs are concentrated in Mecklenburg, Durham and Wake counties, while many rural areas aren’t benefiting significantly from innovation efforts.

According to the report, North Carolina ranks fifth in the country in terms of academic science and engineering research and development spending as a share of the state’s gross domestic product. The spending totaled nearly $3.4 billion as of 2019, mostly occurring at Duke and N.C. State universities and UNC Chapel Hill.

The report also noted that North Carolina’s business R&D as a share of state private-industry output has increased at more than twice the rate of the U.S. average between 2000 and 2019. This pace ranks 11th nationally. The business R&D spending as a percentage of private output, 2.58%, is still slightly below the national average. Industries in states like Washington, California and Massachusetts are spending 5% to 7%. ■

EAST WILMINGTON Thermo Fisher Scientific is considering selling its downtown office building. Wilmington’s tallest building is formerly the headquarters of global contract research organization PPD, which the company acquired for $17.4 billion last year.

PHOTO COURTESY OF POLYQUEST

BALD HEAD ISLAND The U.S. Department of the Interior is auctioning lease rights on May 11 for production on two ocean windenergy sites covering nearly 111,000 acres, located about 20 miles offshore.

The Carolina Long Bay project may be capable of producing electricity for nearly half a million homes.

WILMINGTON Lightweight plastics manufacturer and distributor PolyQuest trademarked a brand of recycled bottle flake and resins called PQRenew. Since 2006, PolyQuest has produced more than 1 billion pounds of high-quality post-consumer bottle flake, post-consumer resin and post-industrial resin.

GREENVILLE The Pirate Entrepreneurship Fund formed with $5 million to support startups connected to East Carolina University,

according to Mark Wdowik, CEO of the group and the East Carolina Angels network. Investments in startups will range from $25,000 to $500,000.

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LUMBERTON Site Selection ranked Lumberton among the country’s Top 10 Micropolitans, or urban areas with a population of at least 10,000 but no greater than 50,000. The magazine’s rankings are determined by the number of major industry projects completed or underway in the year 2021.

ROCKY MOUNT

First Carolina Bank completed a $115 million capital raise through sales of 4.6 million shares. The company said it’s an unprecedented amount of money raised mostly from private individuals by a North Carolina community bank.

TRIAD

RUD Fleet founder and owner Drew Haire completed 10,616 pushups in eight hours to raise money for Forward High Point, a downtown revitalization organization. RUD Fleet provides leasing and titling, transport and delivery, and final-touch services for fleet vehicles.

WINSTON-SALEM Wake Forest School of Medicine received a $2.5 million federal grant from the National Cancer Institute to study cancer of the appendix. About 1 in 100,000 people in the United States is diagnosed with the cancer annually.

SVN Parsons Commercial Group of Boston purchased a 22-building industrial portfolio for $86.6 million. The portfolio includes nine buildings here, four buildings in Clemmons and one in Lexington.

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Axiom Space has partnered with RegenMed Development Organization and Wake Forest Institute of Regenerative Medicine, setting a presence here. To facilitate work to speed up the translation of regenerative medicine technologies, Axiom has signed on as a tenant in RemDO’s Innovation Accelerator.

Javara, a clinical research company, raised $40 million from private-equity firm General Atlantic. Jennifer Byrne, Amanda Wright and Linda McCarty founded the company in 2018. It employs 170 after previously raising $13 million.

TRIANGLE

HIGH POINT

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CARY Epic Games, the creator of Fortnite, received investments of $1 billion each from Sony and the company that makes Lego.

Founded by CEO Tim Sweeney in 1991, the company is now valued at $31.5 billion and has some 40 offices around the world.

CHAPEL HILL The UNC Board of Governors approved a lease for UNC Chapel Hill to operate a 20,000-square-foot innovation hub that will connect the university with downtown. Innovate Carolina is part of the larger East Rosemary Street redevelopment project by Grubb Properties and the town of Chapel Hill.

Jim Kitchen, a UNC Chapel Hill professor, was one of six astronauts who went above the Kármán Line, the border between Earth’s atmosphere and outer space. This was the fourth human spaceflight and 20th overall for the aerospace company Blue Origin.

New Jersey investor Friedlam Partners paid $63.35 million for the 400-unit SoHo Apartment Homes. That is equivalent to about $158,000 per unit. The seller paid $25.95 million for the site in 2017.

Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer is acquiring ReViral, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company with a headquarters here, for as much as $525 million. Pfizer believes the candidates ReViral is developing to treat respiratory syncytial virus could generate more than $1.5 billion annually.

The Durham City Council voted to spend $10.5 million to renovate Durham Bulls Athletic Park, whose main tenant is the minor-league baseball team. An agreement with Major League Baseball requires the city to upgrade the stadium

by April 2025.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF AXIOM SPACE

QVC will not rebuild the distribution center destroyed in a December fire. The shopping network said it may lease or sell the land. Nearly 2,000 people worked at the operation.

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Statewide

PINEHURST

DOBSON

Plans to build a 34-room hotel at Pinehurst Resort and Country Club have been placed on hold after unforeseen challenges. The project is no longer scheduled to be completed before the U.S. Open returns in 2024.

RALEIGH

A new 195-acre solar farm in Surry County includes 76,600 panels and will power the equivalent of 5,000 homes, according to Duke Energy. The Stony Knoll Solar facility is 22.6-megawatts.

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N.C. State University researchers developed a new membrane technology allowing for more efficient removal of carbon dioxide from mixed gases, such as emissions from power plants. Among the research leaders is Rich Spontak, a distinguished professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering.

Murphy’s Naturals, a veteran-owned company founded in 2014, nearly completed an $8.5 million Series A fundraising round. The company, which has about 35 employees based in the Triangle, pivoted operations to manufacture hand sanitizer following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

CHARLOTTE

CHARLOTTE Charlotte Douglas International Airport was the fifth-busiest airport worldwide for arrivals and departures in 2021, according to preliminary rankings from the Airports Council International. It ranked sixth worldwide for passenger traffic in 2021, compared with 18th in 2020.

The Innovation District project at Appalachian State University broke ground with work underway on the Conservatory for Biodiversity and Education.

The project will include a mix of laboratories, meeting spaces and gardens.

WILKESBORO Plans call for multiple motorsports series races at North Wilkesboro Speedway in August after owner Speedway Motorsports received $18 million in federal stimulus funds. The event at the long-dormant venue will be followed by the removal of the asphalt track for dirt-track racing in October.

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The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools board voted 7-2 to end the employment contract of Superintendent Earnest Winston. Winston was appointed as leader of the 140,000-student system in August 2019.

CHINA GROVE Macy’s pledged to invest $584 million in a 1.4 million-square-foot “automated, direct to consumer” fulfillment center here. The warehouse is expected to be operating in 2024 and will account for about 30% of the company’s digital supply-chain capacity. It will create as many as 2,500 full-time jobs.

DALLAS

WEST BOONE

The Carolina Panthers terminated its construction contract with the city of Rock Hill for a new team headquarters after spending $170 million on the project. It cited disagreements over financing.

Original plans contemplated offices, practice fields, and residential and retail space.

Vela Uptown of New York acquired the Levine Museum of the New South building uptown for $10.75 million. It is joining New York-based Post Road Residential to develop a new building at the site.

Honeywell CEO Darius Adamczyk received a compensation package of $26.1 million in 2021, his largest ever. Honeywell’s previous CEO, David Cote, earned total compensation of $34.5 million in 2015 and $29.1 million in 2014.

The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Transit Administration announced a $20 billion-plus investment in American transit. North Carolina will receive $176.6 million, with the Charlotte region securing $34 million. Raleigh and Durham will receive $19.3 million and $11.6 million, respectively.

Gaston Aquatics plans a $10 million regional aquatics center in Dallas on property near Gaston College. The project has a $4 million matching grant from the state, along with $750,000 in private contributions.

MOORESVILLE Home improvement chain Lowes appointed Brandon Sink, its senior vice president of retail finance, as chief financial officer, succeeding David Denton. Denton is expected to join at another publicly traded company.

▲ Brandon Sink

PHOTOS COURTESY OF CHARLOTTE DOUGLAS INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, LOWE’S

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IN NORTH CAROLINA, SMALL BUSINESS IS BIG BUSINESS. We are looking to find the best Tar Heel small businesses.

2022 marks our 27th year of honoring the contributions small businesses make to our state’s economy.

The winners will be profiled in the December 2022 issue.

We ask for your help to find the small businesses that best represent North Carolina.

Please submit your nominations by June 18, 2022.

To submit a nomination, you can either: 1) Go to businessnc.com/smallbusiness for online nomination forms, or 2) Fill out the form below and email or mail it to us, using the information below.

You may nominate as many companies as you wish, but they must be: • Smaller than 100 employees • Based in North Carolina • Independently owned with at least one owner active in the business • In business for at least three years

NOMINEE INFORMATION Company name: _______________________________________________________________________________________________________ Contact person: _____________________________________________________________________ Title: _____________________________ Address: _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Phone number: __________________________________ Email (if available): __________________________________________________

YOUR INFORMATION Name: ___________________________________________ Company name: _____________________________________________________ Phone number: __________________________________ Email _______________________________________________________________

We mail entry forms to the nominees so they have the opportunity to provide more information about their companies.

Visit businessnc.com/smallbusiness for more details. Nominations must be received by June 18, 2022.

Submit your nomination online at businessnc.com/smallbusiness or mail to: Small Business of the Year, Business North Carolina, 1230 W. Morehead Street, Suite 308, Charlotte, NC 28208 If you have questions, call Jennifer Ware at (704) 927-6272 or email jware@businessnc.com.

Sponsored by

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ROUND TABLE

LIFE SCIENCES

INCREASING PRODUCTION North Carolina’s dedicated effort to the biotechnology industry stretches back almost 40 years, before the idea was even a twinkle in most states’ eyes. Since then, it has embraced the industry’s many sectors, including biomanufacturing. The industry continues to produce a seemingly continuous supply of announcements, including startups, expansions, investments and jobs. While a solid foundation of support is established, more is needed to sustain the industry and its benefits. Business North Carolina magazine and N.C. Biotechnology Center recently gathered a panel of biotech experts and leaders to frame biomanufacturing’s past, present and future.

BTEC, Eli Lilly, NCBIO, N.C. Biotechnology Center, Smith Anderson and Seqirus sponsored the discussion at N.C. Biotechnology Center, which was moderated by Business North Carolina Publisher Ben Kinney. It was edited for brevity and clarity.

Photography by Bryan Regan

WHAT IS THE CURRENT STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA BIOMANUFACTURING? EDGETON: North Carolina welcomed 34 life-sciences companies last year. They invested almost $4 billion and announced about 4,000 jobs. We currently have about 30 active projects. We’ve done really well in recent years, and there’s no reason why that won’t continue.

The industry’s footprint is spreading.

Drugmaker Eli Lilly, for example, recently announced it’s building a $1 billion

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factory, which will employ about 600 people, in the Charlotte suburb of Concord. We’ll see more investments and innovations in the Charlotte region, which is welcoming two medical schools and has access to plenty of capital.

Every community that we talk to is doing something within the industry. Much of that is driven by post-pandemic activities.

We have the opportunity for a significant grant through the federal Build Back Better Challenge Grant. We coordinated the application for 28 peers statewide, and we won $500,000 in Phase I. We

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submitted Phase II on March 15, and we hope to hear its result in mid-September.

The state will see about $70 million, if it comes through. Most of that money will be used to diversify the industry’s workforce and share its wealth and experience with communities that haven’t experienced either. Workforce is the key to unlocking future growth in biomanufacturing. We’re excited. It wouldn’t happen without great partnerships.

GUNTER: It’s an exciting time. We’ve seen tremendous growth. Supply chain

SPONSORED SECTION

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PICTURED BELOW, FIRST ROW:

DOUG EDGETON

president and CEO, N.C. Biotechnology Center

GARY GILLESKIE

Biomanufacturing Training and Education Center executive director, N.C. State University

LAURA GUNTER

president, North Carolina Biosciences Organization SECOND ROW:

VERN HORNER

head of project management office and operational governance, Seqirus

SHEILA MIKHAIL

co-founder and CEO, AskBio

STEPHENIE ROBERTSON

vice president of operations, Fujifilm Diosynth Biotechnologies THIRD ROW:

EMILY SISK

BioNetwork executive director, N.C. Community College System

JOHN WAGNER

program manager, Biotech Manufacturers Forum, North Carolina Biosciences Organization

DAN VONDIELINGEN

RTP site head, Eli Lilly and Co.

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PROUD PAST AND STRONG FUTURE Santo Costa is no stranger to the pharmaceutical, health care and life-sciences industries, where he has worked for 40 years. He is an attorney at Smith Anderson; board chair, NC Biotech; board chair, Aquestive Therapeutics; and a former pharmaceutical executive at Quintiles and Glaxo Inc. He shared his thoughts on biotechnology’s role in the state’s economy.

WHY IS BIOMANUFACTURING IMPORTANT TO NORTH CAROLINA? At Smith Anderson, we work with many life-sciences industry leaders and have seen firsthand how bio-manufacturing puts our state at the forefront of an industry that generates innovation on a global scale. The greatest positive effect of our state’s strength in biomanufacturing are the thousands of jobs that have been created in biomanufacturing and other sectors of the life sciences. As this highly technical industry grows and flourishes, it provides a great incentive for individuals to get technical degrees and training through our universities and community colleges, further cementing the state’s ability to attract world-class talent.

HOW HAS THE STATE POSITIONED ITSELF AS A BIOMANUFACTURING HUB? In large measure, the state positioned itself decades ago to grow biomanufacturing through the efforts of organizations such as N.C. Biotechnology Center and North Carolina Biosciences Organization. These organizations and others have developed and implemented effective outreach programs to target companies in the life sciences, including biomanufacturing.

WHAT ARE THE INDUSTRY’S CHALLENGES? One of the greatest challenges we have is attracting young people to pursue careers in the life sciences. The demand for technically educated and trained individuals will only increase and is one of the lynchpins to a flourishing lifesciences community. Fortunately, we have world-class universities and other institutions that will help meet this challenge.

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and talent are NCBIO’s manufacturing members’ biggest concerns. They want to ensure there is an adequate supply of skilled workers as they expand in North Carolina. We want to help innovative companies, too. NCBIO represents the industry when it comes to legislative policies that make North Carolina a good place for companies to form and grow. We’ve had recent success at the General Assembly.

The Life-Sciences Caucus is interested in what it can do to help the industry. Its members helped adjust some regulatory items last year. We also had an appropriations win when the General Assembly added recurring dollars to the One North Carolina Small Business Program, which will match federal funding awarded to companies for innovative research. We’re always looking for ways to bring more capital to the state. We have biomanufacturers moving to North Carolina. Companies are working from product inception through the start of manufacturing. A large group of companies are moving into the commercialization stage, bringing products to the market. In the past, those companies may have sold that technology to a larger company.

ROBERTSON: Fujifilm Diosynth Biotechnologies is growing tremendously. It has acquired several sites since I joined the company four years ago. It is building a large facility for mammalian cell culture in Holly Springs that will create about 475 jobs over the next five years. A nearly 32,000-square-foot expansion was recently completed at our Research Triangle Park facility. It expands downstream capability and adds a receiving warehouse, which was something missing from the site for some time. And soon we’ll break ground on an 83,000-square-foot expansion to our BioProcess Innovation Center, which is at RTP, too. It will almost double capacity and add about 150 jobs by 2024. Growing demand for process characterization, quality control services, and analytical and process development put us in a place

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where we need to expand. The company also recently acquired a cell therapy facility in California and is establishing a new process development and manufacturing facility for viral vectors and advanced therapies in Boston.

as it has been for many companies and individuals. There’s not enough of some things that we need. So, it’s constant conversations with suppliers, making sure they know when we need materials and confirming that they can deliver them.

plan to open a U.S.-based origin facility and companion CDMO factory. We’re pushing many gene-therapy programs through the clinic, including ones for Parkinson’s disease, heart failure and Pompe disease. We’re excited about it.

HORNER: It has been a busy time for Seqirus. We’re improving our process and yield, expanding capacity to match growing demand, especially for influenza vaccines, which is an effect of the COVID-19 pandemic. CDC requested more flu vaccines during the pandemic in hopes of keeping more people out of hospitals.

We’re developing an sa-MRNA flu vaccine, which is similar to the approach used to create the COVID-19 vaccines, in parallel with extending the use of our cell-based flu vaccine. The supply chain has been a challenge over the past 12 to 18 months,

MIKHAIL: COVID-19 did not impact us negatively. We doubled our size in the United States and tripled our size overseas in one year. We have about 700 employees, and we’re expecting to grow to 1,000 during the first quarter of next year. Our contract development and manufacturing business has seen growing demand. Gene-therapy manufacturing is in demand. We recently opened a more than 380,000-square-foot commercial factory overseas, where most of our manufacturing is located. Our process development is in North Carolina. We

VONDIELINGEN: We’re seeing tremendous growth in our company and others in North Carolina’s biomanufacturing industry. We purchased more than 200 acres of land in RTP in the last two years.

We’re nearing construction completion of our manufacturing factory on that site, and we’ll do our first-process validation there during the second half of this year. We’ll be manufacturing medicine very soon. We announced our Concord expansion, which includes a state-of-the-art factory on about 400 acres of land, in January. Those two announcements will create about 1,200 jobs.

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We recently hired our 150th Lilly RTP employee. The economic incentives that North Carolina offers are good, without doubt. But what differentiates it from other states is forums such as NCBIO and the Biotech Center. They rally industry, educational institutions, government and community behind biomanufacturing and grow its workforce.

They’re where we heard state legislators talk about the importance of partnering with community colleges. As we’ve come into North Carolina, we see our peers and colleagues investing in educational and workforce development partnerships. That spurred us to partner with Wake Technical Community College, where we recently cut the ribbon on the Lilly Science and Technology Center at its RTP campus. The Center was conceived about a year and a half ago as a means to train more information-technology and biotechnology workers.

The only way to fill jobs is through growing

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the workforce. We all have employees who have worked for other companies within the industry. A larger workforce is the only way that we’ll minimize trading talent among ourselves. We recognize our role in that, and we’re doubling down on our efforts. I expect the Center to be the first of many opportunities to partner and grow North Carolina’s workforce.

HOW DOES HIGHER EDUCATION SUPPORT THE INDUSTRY? EDGETON: We need skilled workers, but the skill set changes constantly.

So, curriculum has to change, and the equipment has to change. We’re always trying to focus North Carolina on where demand and technology is headed not where it currently resides.

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GILLESKIE: N.C. State University is preparing students for the life-sciences industry.

BTEC, in particular, is focused on biopharmaceutical manufacturing. It attracts students from all over the university. We help them apply their skills in engineering or science to biopharmaceutical manufacturing.

BTEC needs to keep pace with the industry to ensure students are prepared when they graduate. We want them to be trained in gene therapy, for example, which has been a busy sector in North Carolina. Automation and process control are advancing, so we need to make sure they are trained in those areas, too. There is high demand for BTEC’s professional training and its graduates.

About 35 companies participated in BTEC’s most recent career fair. That’s a significant number; there were only about 20 at past fairs. We are fortunate that BTEC students always have found jobs — the placement rate after six months is nearly 100%.

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WAGNER: I was helping Merck select a factory site in the early 2000s, when the decision was made to invest in BTEC and BioNetwork, a workforce-development program. They were the reasons Merck put that factory in North Carolina. They were a differentiator. Other states may have had better incentives, but North Carolina had the strongest commitment to long-term development and support of workforce. We came here on the promise that workforce development was going to be there. If you start and continue those type of programs, you become an attractive location. You can’t wait until after companies arrive. Other states are trying to mimic them, but they’re 25 years behind. The people running North Carolina’s workforce programs have held true to those efforts. But the industry’s growth is pressuring them. We’re always training engineers, biologists and scientists. The

community college programs have done a great job training shopfloor workers.

BioNetwork’s program for technicians was recently reviewed, and we probably will start that process again in a year or so. It was done with biomanufacturing experts. It wasn’t an educational exercise.

They gave their input as to what’s needed from shopfloor workers. They usually are recruited locally, and scientists are recruited regionally, sometimes nationally.

You can have a central BTEC, but training programs need to be distributed. The industry’s geography will expand naturally beyond RTP. SISK: BioWork, a process technician training program, was developed in the early 2000s. It started with the Biotechnology Center, then it made its way to the community college system. It’s a short-term program, 130 to 150 hours over eight to

10 weeks, depending on the college. It provides individuals with the foundational principles of biomanufacturing, so its curriculum must be current. It’s reviewed, with help from industry representatives, every couple of years. That was last done just before the pandemic in 2020, so it’s time to review it again. We’re actively recruiting for gene therapy, a hot sector. Lilly’s Concord announcement has opened the eyes of community colleges outside of RTP and surrounding counties, where most of the state’s biotechnology business has historically been done, to biomanufacturing’s opportunities. We offer biotech training and studies from Caldwell Community College and Technical Institute in the west to Pitt Community College in the east. We can offer it in more locations.

BioNetwork supports all of the state’s community colleges, so wherever a company is located, it can be there.

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WHY DOES NORTH CAROLINA CONTINUE TO ATTRACT BIOMANUFACTURERS? MIKHAIL: It’s because of innovation at local universities. Our company is based on work done at UNC Chapel Hill, but we also have technology that was developed at Duke University. N.C. State University is doing a lot of work with gene therapy.

When you have great innovation that’s accessible locally, there’s no reason to go anywhere else. Professors want to remain affiliated with their academic institutions, so the brain trust is here.

GUNTER: The state played a role in the industry’s development, starting with the early funding of the Biotechnology Center in the late 1980s. Somebody called RTP a natural resource. There’s nothing natural about it. It was intentionally created, as was the Biotechnology Center. The vision of some North Carolinians to engage government has been instrumental. We’re doing things today that down the road, 25 to 30 years in the future, we’ll point to and say those are the things that we lined up.

HOW DID COVID AFFECT THE INDUSTRY? ROBERTSON: Supply chain challenges have been intense the past 18 to 24 months. Lead times for some consumables have jumped to 30, 40, 50 or more weeks from eight to 12 weeks. Demand for those materials has increased tremendously. We’re running our supply chain operations differently. We onboarded more planners. They spend several hours on the phone every day, working out delivery details with vendors. If they can’t get enough for four batches, for example, they’ll ask if there is enough for two batches. We’re looking at alternative suppliers of critical materials. Some vendors say we’ll be beyond these issues in six months. But they’re as intense right now as they were 12 months ago.

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GUNTER: While we never discuss specific technologies between members, we hosted many calls with them during the pandemic to share information, bring experts in to discuss employment issues, vaccine distribution and other pertinent issues. We surveyed members about their COVID response to masks, distancing, curfews, work-at-home options and more.

We shared that information in a noncompetitive anonymized format. It allowed other companies to benchmark their response to COVID-19 and ensured everyone was updated on the latest changes.

HORNER: We really appreciated that NCBIO stepped up. The pandemic-response benchmarks were very helpful, especially during COVID-19’s peak. Our employees would share that they heard this company is doing that or that company is doing this.

We gauged our efforts, letting us know where we needed to be, while everyone remained somewhat confidential. Beyond supply chain issues, the biggest challenge is ensuring that we’re doing the right thing for our patients and our employees. The environment around COVID, including rules and guidance, continues to change constantly. A large part of our emergency management is protecting our manufacturing team. We reduced our plant’s population as much as possible, for example, allowing our most critical people and processes to keep pushing product out the door.

VONDIELINGEN: Supply chain issues and COVID-19 have been challenging enough, but demand for our products is at a level that we have never seen before. It takes a network of companies, many outside biomanufacturing, to make medicine right now. On an average day, we have 500 people onsite in RTP. They’re construction workers, general contractors and from specific trades. While recapitalization efforts and expansions will create a continued need for them down the road, we will see a transition to more than

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500 people making medicine in the next few years. But Lilly employees will be just the tip of the iceberg. North Carolina companies will comprise our supply chain for making medicine, which include many components such as autoinjector parts and printed packaging materials. Other companies are helping us write procedures, commission, qualify, and validate our equipment, ensuring good manufacturing practices. You can no longer rely on a single-source supply chain. You need multiple supply chains. You have to call your suppliers. They need to understand what is critical to you, and you need to appreciate their costs and constraints.

WAGNER: At its onset, some experts predicted the pandemic would last only six months. So, many biomanufacturers decided to weather the storm and fight their way through it. Our industry has a bit larger buffer inventories of supplies than many commodity industries, where goods are turned daily. But that original approach cost us six months. While hindsight is 20/20, we should’ve implemented changes immediately. The pandemic has caused businesses, especially large multinational ones that leverage buying power from a single global source, to rethink their operations. An interruption in that approach affects their entire operation, whereas a local interruption only affects a portion of their network.

GILLESKIE: BTEC is proud of its efforts to effectively train students, so they can get jobs and hit the ground running. But the pandemic has proven challenging to that mission. There was a point during the past two years when most universities, including N.C. State, were effectively shut down. We didn’t have access to buildings or labs. BTEC, like community colleges, offers hands-on training and education.

So, when COVID ‘shut us down,’ we were forced to re-evaluate our approach, finding creative ways to teach labs in a nonhands-on manner. There’s no doubt that

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BTEC will always offer hands-on instruction, but we see more opportunities for online training, too. Teleconferencing, for example, has made it easier to introduce experts, wherever they are in the world, to our students. The pandemic pushed us in that direction, and that’s a good thing.

Supply chain issues also have a large impact on training and education. BTEC conducts labs in all areas of bioprocessing such as cell culture and microbial fermentation. The processes we execute in lab require filters and other components, the same ones used by biomanufacturers. But educational institutions are a low priority for vendors. However, because BTEC’s activities are not conducted in a regulated environment, we can easily switch vendors in hopes of finding what we need.

But technical challenges remain; I can’t switch from one type of filter, for exam-

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ple, to another without data showing that the new filer is suitable for the application.

BTEC’s biggest pandemic-induced challenge is loss of subject-matter experts, which is probably a challenge faced by all training and educational institutions. We have lost a large number of staff — highly skilled Ph.D.s — to industry, where salaries are higher. BTEC gave them excellent experience, seeing and experiencing all facets of biopharmaceutical manufacturing, making them much more valuable.

It’s a serious problem. If it continues, the quality instruction that we want to deploy won’t happen.

SISK: Even procuring personal protective equipment for the few courses we needed to deliver in person was a struggle. Some training was delayed, especially six months to a year

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ago, because we couldn’t obtain required materials.

MIKHAIL: Challenges aren’t bad things.

We always will encounter difficulties, but they can lead to opportunities. We have to look at them in a positive light and ask how we can innovate over the long term. That’s where we’ll find competitive advantages. Biomanufacturers can’t make big changes in the short term because of regulatory constraints. But they can innovate over the long term. Our drugs, for example, have to be stored at -90 degrees Celsius. We examined how COVID was affecting that. We thought about how we could avoid that constraint all together. So, we started working with thin-film technology, which allows us to store our drugs at room temperature and ship them via the U.S. Postal Service.

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WHAT IS THE INDUSTRY’S ROLE IN ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT? EDGETON: We’re blessed because North Carolinians collaborate, and that makes it different than other states.

The Biotech Center and other groups have long histories of keeping the community connected. That has been important. The Build Back Better Challenge Grant, for example, is bringing together industry, academia and government. We’re in the middle, trying to coordinate. A silver lining to the pandemic has been greater acceptance of technology such as teleconferencing.

It’s easy to get people from different companies, governments, economic development agencies and educational institutions on one call. It has been very helpful in moving projects forward.

GUNTER: Collaboration is part of NCBioImpact’s beauty. It was established years ago, creating partnerships between industry and academia. That allows us to evolve together.

WAGNER: Economic development and expansions lead to a stronger industry. We need to support the health of the industry, because we all win when we do. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t stresses. It can be a double-edged sword. When you see 600 jobs announced, for example, you know some of your employees will end up filling some of them. That stresses your current workforce.

GILLESKIE: NCBioImpact is a consortium that includes educational institutions, the Biotech Center and NCBIO. It’s impact on the industry has been huge. It allows

BTEC to coordinate with the community college system, so we’re not duplicating instruction but making complementary efforts. It also is a great collaboration from an economic development standpoint.

That’s reflected in current growth.

HOW IS THE INDUSTRY APPROACHING DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION? VONDIELINGEN: Diversity, equity and inclusion are key for Lilly. Our factories will represent the population of the locations where we operate. One thing that attracted us to North Carolina is access to a diverse, talented and capable workforce. So, as we go through the interviewing process, we make sure that we have a diverse candidate pool. We also employ a diverse interview team. Then

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MIKHAIL: As a Mexican-American and founder of the company, AskBio takes big strides to ensure its workforce is diverse.

Women and individuals of color are well represented in the company. Women are 64% of our manufacturing professionals.

African-Americans are 12% of our workforce, and 17% is Asian. If a company’s leadership is diverse, then it tends to be diverse. People are attracted to companies that have diverse leadership.

nity college can. Only select programs, such as nursing, have enrollment requirements. But that doesn’t mean everyone does. Through the Build Back Better Challenge Grant, we identified a few colleges — the ones closest to RTP — that were working together, identifying diversity, equity and inclusion needs within their programs. Their demographics showed a diverse population, but enrollment from the Hispanic-Latino community was lacking in comparison. The Build Back Better Grant process asked us to name our historically excluded population. That was a new term for us. We’re familiar with underrepresented. It caused us to look inward at our programs and enrollment.

We identified that the Hispanic-Latino population, for example, has been historically missing from life-sciences industry training. A portion of our proposal — and funding if we’re supported — is working with the Hispanic Latino Action Coalition, a collection of nonprofits throughout North Carolina, to speak to and recruit from that community. There is an access gap of Hispanic males to higher education and the community college system as a whole. It was important for us to identify that. Even if we don’t receive the federal funding, we know we need to embrace this population and find ways to bring them into our life-sciences industry programs. It has been a great experience to look more in depth then make changes.

That’s what we’re doing.

SISK: The community college system is a public institution. It’s open enrollment.

Anyone who wants to enroll at a commu-

GILLESKIE: It’s important to have a diverse talent pool, whose members are trained and ready to work in the bioman-

we select the best candidates. That’s proved to be successful for us. When you talk about diversity, there are dimensions you can see and ones you can’t.

We support that with employee resource groups, which are aimed at making sure employees can bring their entire self to work. It takes an entire team to make medicine. We also look at our partners, starting with our suppliers and vendors, ensuring they also support our diversity.

Our partnership with Terrence Holt and Holt Brothers Construction at our RTP site is an excellent example. They’re building and fitting out the interior of our administration, laboratory and multiple support buildings. Terrence and I have a two-way mentorship. We learn from each other. We’re peeling back the curtain at Lilly in terms of how we do things. And he has been valuable in finding meaningful ways for us to engage the community.

It’s absolutely a benefit and core to what we do.

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ufacturing industry. BTEC recruits mostly N.C. State students into its academic programs. Even though we’re part of the College of Engineering, we widened our focus several years ago, recruiting more heavily from the sciences. One of the benefits of that was a flip in the maleto-female ratio. We’re recruiting a higher percentage of female students. Hopefully that helps produce a more diverse pool of talent.

GUNTER: We serve our membership.

We’ve been approached by biomanufacturers that want assistance meeting their diversity goals. NCBIO’s robust Diversity Committee brings together resources.

We’ve organized a couple events, a virtual one during the pandemic and a hybrid one — a combination of in-person and virtual offerings — more recently. We brought together a diverse group of people.

There’s a lot of energy around it, and that’s exciting. If we’re not recruiting and retaining a diverse workforce, then we won’t be able to fill all these jobs. The numbers are too high. We’re not bringing everyone to the table currently. Other initiatives, such as the Build Back Better Challenge Grant, will help jumpstart activity, too, if North Carolina’s proposal is successful. If there’s not a way to get that recognition and understanding out to the community, so individuals can avail themselves of these programs, then we’ve missed the boat.■

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BY PETE M. ANDERSON

T

his list was compiled based on data from the University of North Carolina System and National Center for Education Statistics. Not all applicants who are accepted attend that school. Total cost covers tuition, fees, and room and board for the 2021-22 school year, unless otherwise noted. The undergraduate enrollment total is fulltime undergraduates only for fall 2020. Grant or scholarship aid includes aid received from the federal government, state or local government, the institution and other sources known by the institution for the 2019-2020 school year. Retention rates are for full-time students who began studies in fall 2019 and returned fall 2020. The overall graduation rate tracks the progress of full-time students who began studies in fall 2014 to see if they complete a degree or other award such as a certificate within 150% of “normal time” for completing the program, typically six years. Community college statistics are for 2020-21. * N.C. Promise Tuition Plan ** no on-campus housing

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PUBLIC UNIVERSITIES APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY

BOONE, APPSTATE.EDU Total enrollment: 20,023; undergraduate enrollment: 18,061; contact: 828-262-2120, admissions@appstate.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 18,178/14,453 (80%); total cost (in-state/out-of-state): $20,799/$36,406; average financial aid awarded: $8,130; retention/graduation rate: 73%/73%

EAST CAROLINA UNIVERSITY

GREENVILLE, ECU.EDU Total enrollment: 28,6798; undergraduate enrollment: 23,056; contact: 252-328-6640, admissions@ecu.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 20,313/17,859 (88%); total cost (instate/out-of-state): $23,215/$39,492; average financial aid awarded: $7,722; retention/ graduation rate: 83%/65%

ELIZABETH CITY STATE UNIVERSITY*

ELIZABETH CITY, ECSU.EDU Total enrollment: 2,002; undergraduate enrollment: 1,910; contact: 252-335-3305, admissions@ecsu.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 2,578/1,929 (75%); total cost (instate/out-of-state): $14,425/$18,425; average financial aid awarded: $8,458; retention/ graduation rate: 75%/43%

FAYETTEVILLE STATE UNIVERSITY

FAYETTEVILLE, UNCFSU.EDU Total enrollment: 6,726; undergraduate enrollment: 5,661; contact: 910-672-1371, admissions@uncfsu.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 4,611/3,660 (79%); total cost (in-state/out-of-state): $17,626/$29,234; average financial aid awarded: $7,629; retention/graduation rate: 65%/36%

NORTH CAROLINA AGRICULTURAL AND TECHNICAL STATE UNIVERSITY

GREENSBORO, NCAT.EDU Total enrollment: 12,753; undergraduate enrollment: 11,130; contact: 336-334-7496, uadmit@ncat.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 16,366/9,281, (57%); total cost (instate/ out-of-state): $18,612/$32,122; average financial aid awarded: $8,760; retention/ graduation rate: 79%/52%

NORTH CAROLINA CENTRAL UNIVERSITY

DURHAM, NCCU.EDU Total enrollment: 8,078; undergraduate enrollment: 6,067; contact: 919-530-6100, admissions@nccu.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 7,496/6,553 (87%); total cost (instate/out-of-state): $25,160/$37,867; average financial aid awarded: $9,329; retention/ graduation rate: 78%/52%

NORTH CAROLINA STATE UNIVERSITY

RALEIGH, NCSU.EDU Total enrollment: 36,042; undergraduate enrollment: 26,150; contact: 919-5152011, undergrad-admissions@ncsu.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 31,487/14,553 (46%); total cost (in-state/out-of-state): $24,986/$45,771; average financial aid awarded: $10,175; retention/graduation rate: 94%/85%

UNC ASHEVILLE

ASHEVILLE, UNCA.EDU Total enrollment: 3,363; undergraduate enrollment: 3,358; contact: 828-251-6481, admissions@unca.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 3,115/2,474 (79%); total cost (instate/out-of-state): $21,231/$38,579; average financial aid awarded: $7,327; retention/ graduation rate: 76%/62%

UNC CHAPEL HILL

CHAPEL HILL, UNC.EDU Total enrollment: 30,092; undergraduate enrollment: 19,395; contact: 919-966-3621, unchelp@admissions.unc.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 41,773/10,445 (25%); total cost (in-state/out-of-state): $24,770/$52,633; average financial aid awarded: $15,936; retention/graduation rate: 95%/91%

UNC CHARLOTTE

CHARLOTTE, UNCC.EDU Total enrollment: 30,146; undergraduate enrollment: 24,175; contact: 704-687-5507, admissions@uncc.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 19,949/15,866 (80%); total cost (instate/out-of-state): $23,716/$37,150; average financial aid awarded: $7,347; retention/ graduation rate: 85%/65%

UNC GREENSBORO

GREENSBORO, UNCG.EDU Total enrollment: 19,764; undergraduate enrollment: 15,995; contact: 336.334.5243, admissions@uncg.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 9,870/ 8,640 (88%); total cost (instate/out-of-state): $20,404/$35,563; average financial aid awarded: $8,451; retention/ graduation rate: 81%/58%

UNC PEMBROKE*

PEMBROKE, UNCP.EDU Total enrollment: 8,262; undergraduate enrollment: 6,436; contact: 910.521.6262, admissions@uncp.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 5,021/4,588 (91%); total cost (instate/out-of-state): $16,195/$20,195; average financial aid awarded: $5,831; retention/ graduation rate: 70%/42%

UNC SCHOOL OF THE ARTS WINSTON-SALEM, UNCSA.EDU Total enrollment: 1,070; undergraduate enrollment: 920; contact: 336-770-3290, admissions@uncsa.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 1,197/435 (36%); total cost (in-state/out-of-state): $24,335/$41,569; average financial aid awarded: $10,444; retention/graduation rate: 92%/73%

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UNC WILMINGTON

WESTERN CAROLINA UNIVERSITY*

WILMINGTON, UNCW.EDU Total enrollment: 17,915; undergraduate enrollment: 14,650; contact: 910-9623243, admissions@uncw.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 13,633/9,266 (68%); total cost (in-state/out-of-state): $25,855/$39,920; average financial aid awarded: $6,744; retention/graduation rate: 84%/74%

CULLOWHEE, WCU.EDU Total enrollment: 12,243; undergraduate enrollment: 10,517; contact: 828-2277317, admiss@email.wcu.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 15,036/7,290 (49%); total cost (in-state/out-of-state): $19,018/$23,018; average financial aid awarded: $5,641; retention/graduation rate: 81%/63%

WINSTON-SALEM STATE UNIVERSITY

WINSTON-SALEM, WSSU.EDU Total enrollment: 5,169; undergraduate enrollment: 4,689; contact: 336-7502074, admissions@wssu.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 5,182/3,758 (73%); total cost (in-state/out-of-state): $22,603/$33,259; average financial aid awarded: $8,138; retention/graduation rate: 77%/50%

PRIVATE INSTITUTIONS BARTON COLLEGE

CABARRUS COLLEGE OF HEALTH SCIENCES

WILSON, BARTON.EDU Total enrollment: 1,177; contact: 252629-5472, enroll@barton.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 3,890/1,633 (42%); student/ faculty ratio: 13/1; total cost: $47,750; average financial aid awarded: $21,762; retention/ graduation rate: 70%/52%

BELMONT ABBEY COLLEGE BELMONT, BELMONTABBEYCOLLEGE.EDU Total enrollment: 1,467; contact: 888-2220110, admissions@bac.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 2,292/1,833 (80%); student/faculty ratio: 15/1; total cost: $33,990; average financial aid awarded: $9,984; retention/graduation rate: 70%/46%

BENNETT COLLEGE

GREENSBORO, BENNETT.EDU Total enrollment: 232; contact: (336) 3708624, admissions@bennett.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 2,021/1,475 (73%); student/faculty ratio: 7/1; total cost: $35,872; average financial aid awarded: $13,220; retention/graduation rate: 52%/29%

BREVARD COLLEGE

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CAMPBELL UNIVERSITY

BUIES CREEK, CAMPBELL.EDU Total enrollment: 5,964; contact: 800-3344111, 910-893-1200, admissions@campbell. edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 5,025/4,070 (81%); student/faculty ratio: 15/1; total cost: $58,800; average financial aid awarded: $22,754; retention/ graduation rate: 76%/56%

CAROLINA CHRISTIAN COLLEGE

BREVARD, BREVARD.EDU Total enrollment: 828; contact: 828.641.0641, admissions@brevard.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 3,044/1,369 (45%); student/faculty ratio: 11/1; total cost: $44,650; average financial aid awarded: $19,726; retention/graduation rate: 60%/39%

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CONCORD, ATRIUMHEALTH.ORG/ EDUCATION/CABARRUS-COLLEGEOF-HEALTH-SCIENCES Total enrollment: 526; contact: 704-403-1556, admissions@cabarruscollege.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 65/23 (35%); student/ faculty ratio: 7/1; total cost: $31,290; average financial aid awarded: $6,712; graduation rate: 65%

WINSTON-SALEM, CAROLINA.EDU Total enrollment: 74; contact: 336-744-0900; student/faculty ratio: 13/1; total cost: $15,530; average financial aid awarded: $7,307; retention/ graduation rate: 70%/100%

CAROLINA COLLEGE OF BIBLICAL STUDIES

FAYETTEVILLE, CCBS.EDU Total enrollment: 167; contact: 910-323-5614, admissions@ccbs.edu; student/faculty ratio: 6/1; total cost: $21,943**; average financial aid awarded: $5,858; graduation rate: 67%

CAROLINA UNIVERSITY

WINSTON-SALEM, CAROLINAU.EDU Total enrollment: 951; contact: 800-9375097, admissions@carolinau.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 461/230 (50%); student/ faculty ratio: 10/1; total cost: $27,500; average financial aid awarded: $7,367; retention/graduation rate: 49%/46%

CATAWBA COLLEGE

SALISBURY, CATAWBA.EDU Total enrollment: 1,371; contact: 800-CATAWBA, 704-637-4402, admission@ catawba.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 3,254/1,692 (52%); student/ faculty ratio: 12/1; total cost: $48,344; average financial aid awarded: $24,603; retention/ graduation rate: 72%/56%

CHAMBERLAIN UNIVERSITY NORTH CAROLINA

CHARLOTTE, CHAMBERLAIN.EDU Total enrollment: 259; contact: 877-751-5783; freshman applicants/accepted: 3/1 (33%); student/faculty ratio: 13/1; total cost: $40,545; average financial aid awarded: $3,517

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CHARLOTTE CHRISTIAN COLLEGE AND THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY

ELON UNIVERSITY

CHARLOTTE, CHARLOTTECHRISTIAN. EDU Total enrollment: 182; contact: 704-334-6882, admissions@charlottechristian.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 8/1; total cost: $36,324; average financial aid awarded: $2,826

CHOWAN UNIVERSITY

MURFREESBORO, CHOWAN.EDU Total enrollment: 1,100; contact: 888-4-CHOWAN, 252-398-6500, admissions@ chowan.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 2,549/1,707 (67%); student/ faculty ratio: 16/1; total cost: $38,170; average financial aid awarded: $20,662; retention/ graduation rate: 59%/31%

DAVIDSON COLLEGE

ELON, ELON.EDU Total enrollment: 7,117; contact: 336-2783566, admissions@elon.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 15,306/11,020 (72%); student/faculty ratio: 13/1; total cost: $55,647; average financial aid awarded: $14,980; retention/graduation rate: 90%/83%

GARDNER-WEBB UNIVERSITY

BOILING SPRINGS, GARDNER-WEBB. EDU Total enrollment: 3,536; contact: 704-4062550, admissions@gardner-webb.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 5,370/4,188 (78%); student/faculty ratio: 13/1; total cost: $46,990; average financial aid awarded: $20,269; retention/ graduation rate: 68%/56%

GREENSBORO COLLEGE

DAVIDSON, DAVIDSON.EDU Total enrollment: 1,983; contact: 800-7680380, admission@davidson.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 5,621/1,124 (20%); student/faculty ratio: 9/1; total cost: $73,200; average financial aid awarded: $42,045; retention/graduation rate: 93%/93%

GREENSBORO, GREENSBORO.EDU Total enrollment: 944; contact: 336-272-7102, admissions@greensboro.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 1,014/790 (78%); student/faculty ratio: 8/1; total cost: $32,984; average financial aid awarded: $11,988; retention/ graduation rate: 63%/34%

DEVRY UNIVERSITY

GUILFORD COLLEGE

CHARLOTTE, DEVRY.EDU Total enrollment: 41; contact: 704-697-1020; undergrad applicants/accepted: 3/1 (33%); student/faculty ratio: 3/1; total cost: $38,444; average financial aid awarded: $4,495; graduation rate: 25%

DUKE UNIVERSITY

DURHAM, DUKE.EDU Total enrollment: 16,172; contact: 919-6843214, undergrad-admissions@duke.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 39,639/ 3,171 (8%); student/faculty ratio: 6/1; total cost: $79,860; average financial aid awarded: $48,351; retention/ graduation rate: 97%/96%

ECPI UNIVERSITY

CHARLOTTE, GREENSBORO, RALEIGH, ECPI.EDU Contact: 704-751-4558 (Charlotte campus), 336- 792-7594 (Greensboro campus), 919283-5748 (Raleigh campus); student/faculty ratio: 11/1; total cost: $30,692**; retention/ graduation rate: 61%/47%

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GREENSBORO, GUILFORD.EDU Total enrollment: 1,429; contact: 336-3162000, admission@guilford.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 3,660/2,854 (78%); student/faculty ratio: 12/1; total cost: $56,710; average financial aid awarded: $27,155; retention/graduation rate: 72%/49%

HERITAGE BIBLE COLLEGE DUNN, HERITAGEBIBLECOLLEGE. EDU Total enrollment: 43; contact: 910-892-3178, ext. 236, drzonca@heritagebiblecollege. edu; student/faculty ratio: 5/1; total cost: $23,326**; average financial aid awarded: $5,074

HIGH POINT UNIVERSITY

HIGH POINT, HIGHPOINT.EDU Total enrollment: 5,617; contact: 800-3456993, 336-841-9000, admiss@highpoint.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 11,266/8,674 (77%); student faculty ratio: 17/1; total cost: $59,408; average financial aid awarded: $13,685; retention/ graduation rate: 82%/69%

JOHNSON & WALES UNIVERSITY

CHARLOTTE, JWU.EDU/CAMPUSES/ CHARLOTTE Total enrollment: 1,396; contact: 866-5982427, 980-598-1100, clt@admissions.jwu.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 3,920/3,214 (82%); student/ faculty ratio: 15/1; total cost: $54,540; average financial aid awarded: $22,135; retention/ graduation rate: 65%/57%

JOHNSON C. SMITH UNIVERSITY

CHARLOTTE, JCSU.EDU Total enrollment: 1,306; contact: 704-3781010, admissions@jcsu.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 7,160/3,508 (49%); student/ faculty ratio: 13/1; total cost: $33,444; average financial aid awarded: $13,533; retention/ graduation rate: 65%/44%

LEES-MCRAE COLLEGE

BANNER ELK, LMC.EDU Total enrollment: 838; contact: 828-898-5241, admissions@lmc.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 1,430/1,043 (73%); student/faculty ratio: 11/1; total cost: $42,640; average financial aid awarded: $16,898; retention/ graduation rate: 68%/44%

LENOIR-RHYNE UNIVERSITY

ASHEVILLE, HICKORY, LR.EDU Total enrollment: 2,686; contact: 828328-1741, admission@lr.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 6,194/4,769 (77%); student/faculty ratio: 13/1; total cost: $58,910; average financial aid awarded: $29,998; retention/graduation rate: 73%/45%

LIVING ARTS COLLEGE

RALEIGH, LIVING-ARTS-COLLEGE. EDU Total enrollment: 171; contact: 919-488-8504, info@living-arts-college.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 71/71 (100%); student/ faculty ratio: 6/1; total cost: $31,782; average financial aid awarded: $4,758; retention/ graduation rate: 67%/48%

LIVINGSTONE COLLEGE

SALISBURY, LIVINGSTONE.EDU Total enrollment: 845; contact: 800-835-3435, 704-216-6001, admissions@livingstone.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 5,395/3,722 (69%); student/faculty ratio: 12/1; total cost: $28,390; average financial aid awarded: $12,554; retention/ graduation rate: 47%/28%

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LOUISBURG COLLEGE

LOUISBURG, LOUISBURG.EDU Total enrollment: 490; contact: 919- 4962521, admissions@louisburg.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 952/780 (82%); student/ faculty ratio: 11/1; total cost: $35,630; average financial aid awarded: $14,654; retention/ graduation rate: 56%/21%

MANNA UNIVERSITY

FAYETTEVILLE, MANNA.EDU Total enrollment: 247; contact: 910-2212224, admissions@manna.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 13/13 (100%); student/ faculty ratio: 10/1; total cost: $22,280; average financial aid awarded: $5,352; retention/graduation rate: 100%/90%

MEREDITH COLLEGE

RALEIGH, MEREDITH.EDU Total enrollment: 1,802; contact: 919-7608581, admissions@meredith.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 1,674/1,205(72%); student/faculty ratio: 11/1; total cost: $56,034; average financial aid awarded: $25,330; retention/ graduation rate: 86%/64%

METHODIST UNIVERSITY

FAYETTEVILLE, METHODIST.EDU Total enrollment: 1,773; contact: 800-4887110, 910-630-7000, admissions@methodist. edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 2,964/2,252 (76%); student/faculty ratio: 10/1; total cost: $55,938; average financial aid awarded: $22,645; retention/ graduation rate: 58%/39%

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JACKSONVILLE, MILLER-MOTTE.EDU Total enrollment: 238; contact: 910-7789304; student/faculty ratio: 30/1; retention/ graduation rate: 54%/54%

MILLER-MOTTE COLLEGE

WILMINGTON, MILLER-MOTTE.EDU Total enrollment: 2,506; contact: 910-6325542; student/faculty ratio: 44/1; total cost: $59,244**; average financial aid awarded: $4,639; graduation rate: 17%

MONTREAT COLLEGE

MONTREAT, BLACK MOUNTAIN, MONTREAT.EDU Total enrollment: 950; contact: 828-6698012, admissions@montreat.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 861/611 (71%); student/ faculty ratio: 8/1; total cost: $43,240; average financial aid awarded: $15,800; retention/ graduation rate: 68%/34%

NORTH CAROLINA WESLEYAN COLLEGE

ROCKY MOUNT, NCWC.EDU Total enrollment: 1,720; contact: 252-9855200, 800-488-6292, admissions@ncwc.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 3,358/1,611 (48%); student/ faculty ratio: 13/1; total cost: $47,789; average financial aid awarded: $20,097; retention/ graduation rate: 66%/31%

NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY

ELIZABETH CITY, MACUNIVERSITY. EDU Total enrollment: 165; contact: 252-334-2000 ext. 3013, admissions@macuniversity.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 218/93 (43%); student/faculty ratio: 10/1; total cost: $32,240; average financial aid awarded: $10,783; retention/ graduation rate: 48%/38%

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MILLER-MOTTE COLLEGE

RALEIGH, MILLER-MOTTE.EDU Total enrollment: 282; contact: 919-2306471; student/faculty ratio: 22/1; retention/ graduation rate: 39%/45%

MARS HILL, MHU.EDU Total enrollment: 1,049; contact: 828-6891201, admissions@mhu.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 1,718/1,151 (67%); student/faculty ratio: 10/1; total cost: $47,489; average financial aid awarded: $24,568; retention/graduation rate: 67%/35%

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FAYETTEVILLE, MILLER-MOTTE.EDU Total enrollment: 259; contact: 910-2383077; student/faculty ratio: 20/1; retention/ graduation rate: 44%/55%

MILLER-MOTTE COLLEGE

MARS HILL UNIVERSITY

MID-ATLANTIC CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY

MILLER-MOTTE COLLEGE

CHARLOTTE, ONLINE, NORTHEASTERN.EDU/CHARLOTTE Total enrollment: 22,9057; contact: 980-2248467, charlotte@northeastern.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 64,459/12,891 (20%); student/faculty ratio: 14/1; total cost: $78,202; average financial aid awarded: $28,535; retention/graduation rate: 97%/90%

PFEIFFER UNIVERSITY

MISENHEIMER, CHARLOTTE, RALEIGH DURHAM, PFEIFFER.EDU Total enrollment: 1,185; contact: Misenheimer campus — 800-338-2060, Charlotte, Raleigh-Durham campuses — 704-521-9116, admissions@pfeiffer.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 1,796/1,364 (76%); student/faculty ratio: 10/1; total cost: $48,254; average financial aid awarded: $24,617; retention/graduation rate: 67%/43%

QUEENS UNIVERSITY OF CHARLOTTE

CHARLOTTE, QUEENS.EDU Total enrollment: 2,338; contact: 704-3372212, admissions@queens.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 3,437/2,337 (68%); student/faculty ratio: 10/1; total cost: $55,498; average financial aid awarded: $21,940; retention/graduation rate: 79%/57%

SAINT AUGUSTINE’S UNIVERSITY

RALEIGH, ST-AUG.EDU Total enrollment: 1,110; contact: 919-5164012, 919-516-4018, admissions@st-aug.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 5,887/3,944 (67%); student/ faculty ratio: 12/1; total cost: $32,118; average financial aid awarded: $14,733; retention/ graduation rate: 52%/19%

SALEM COLLEGE

WINSTON-SALEM, SALEM.EDU Total enrollment: 636; contact: 336-7212621, admissions@salem.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 872/741 (85%); student/ faculty ratio: 15/1; total cost: $49,466; average financial aid awarded: $21,320; retention/graduation rate: 48%/66%

SHAW UNIVERSITY

RALEIGH, SHAWU.EDU Total enrollment: 1,283; admissions contact: 800- 214-6683, 919-546-8275, admissions@ shawu.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 6,437/4,570 (71%); student/faculty ratio: 14/1; total cost: $29,734; average financial aid awarded: $11,627; graduation/retention rate: 67%/19%

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SOUTHEASTERN BAPTIST THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY

WAKE FOREST UNIVERSITY

SOUTHEASTERN FREE WILL BAPTIST BIBLE COLLEGE

WARREN WILSON COLLEGE

WAKE FOREST, SEBTS.EDU Total enrollment: 3,343; contact: 919-7612100, admissions@sebts.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 222/182 (82%); student/faculty ratio: 10/1; total cost: $25,838; average financial aid awarded: $3,296; retention/graduation rate: 76%/41%

SWANNANOA, WARREN-WILSON. EDU Total enrollment: 703; contact: 800-9343536, admit@warren-wilson.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 1,273/1,082 (85%); student/faculty ratio: 9/1; total cost: $54,080; average financial aid awarded: $25,036; retention/ graduation rate: 57%/42%

WENDELL, SFWBC.EDU Total enrollment: 62; contact: 919-365-7711, info@sfwbc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 6/1; total cost: $20,203; average financial aid awarded: $5,863; retention/ graduation rate: 64%/48%

ST. ANDREWS UNIVERSITY

WATTS SCHOOL OF NURSING

LAURINBURG, SA.EDU Total enrollment: 887; contact: 910-277-5555, admissions@sa.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 2,343/1,429 (61%); student/ faculty ratio: 13/1; total cost: $49,100; average financial aid awarded: $17,008; retention/ graduation rate: 53%/33%

DURHAM, WATTSSCHOOLOFNURSING.ORG Total enrollment: 150; contact: 919-470-7348, wsninfo@duke.edu; student/faculty ratio: 11/1; total cost: $21,322; average financial aid awarded: $5,607

STRAYER UNIVERSITY NORTH CAROLINA

CHARLOTTE, CONCORD, GREENSBORO, HUNTERSVILLE, MORRISVILLE, RALEIGH, STRAYERUNIVERSITY.EDU Total enrollment: 5,441; contact: Greensboro —336-315-7800, virtualadvising@strayer.edu, North Charlotte campus — 704-886-6500, South Charlotte campus — 704-499-9200; North Raleigh campus — 919-301-6500; South Raleigh campus — 919-890-7500; student/faculty ratio: 28/1; total cost: $23,985**; average financial aid awarded: $4,889; retention rate: 33%

UNIVERSITY OF MOUNT OLIVE

MOUNT OLIVE, DURHAM, GOLDSBORO, SMITHFIELD, UMO.EDU Total enrollment: 2,536; contact: 919-6587794, admissions@umo.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 2,237/1,386 (62%); student/faculty ratio: 16/1; total cost: $35,138; average financial aid awarded: $9,768; retention/graduation rate: 65%/46%

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WINSTON-SALEM, WFU.EDU Total enrollment: 8,789; contact: 336.758.5201, admissions@wfu.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 11,959/3,826 (32%); student/faculty ratio: 11/1; total cost: $79,886; average financial aid awarded: $37,880; retention/ graduation rate: 95%/89%

WESTERN GOVERNORS UNIVERSITY

UNC System revenues 2021 ($12.3 billion)

State appropriations 25% Gifts/investment income/endowments 14% Tuition/fees 14% Federal appropriations/grants 12% Noncapital contributions 9% Sales/services 8% Other 18%

UNC System expenditures 2021 ($9.4 billion)

DURHAM, ONLINE, WGU.EDU/ NORTH-CAROLINA Total enrollment: 147,866; contact: 866-9030109; student/faculty ratio: 42/1; total cost: $14,652**; average financial aid awarded: $4,147; retention/ graduation rate: 75%/47%

WILLIAM PEACE UNIVERSITY

RALEIGH, PEACE.EDU Total enrollment: 830; contact: 919-5082214, admissions@peace.edu; freshman applicants/ accepted: 1,277/778 (61%); student/faculty ratio: 12/1; total cost: $49,183; average financial aid: $19,015; retention/ graduation rate: 74%/38%

WINGATE UNIVERSITY

WINGATE, CHARLOTTE, HENDERSONVILLE, WINGATE.EDU Total enrollment: 3,653; contact: 704233-8200, admit@wingate.edu; freshman applicants/accepted: 16,841/12,293 (73%); student/faculty ratio: 15/1; total cost: $55,780; average financial aid: $28,756; retention/ graduation rate: 64%/49%

Instruction

27%

Auxiliaries

18%

Research

12%

Academic support

18%

Institutional support

8%

Scholarship/fellowships

6%

Physical plant operations

6%

Other

15%

source: The University of North Carolina System

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Capital gains UNC System’s endowments benefit from aggressive private-equity strategy.

T

s he UNC System has a $10 billion endowment fund that has enjoyed unusual success in recent years because of a signifcant bet on private equity and venture capital.

The Chapel Hill-based UNC Investment Fund manages most, but not all, of the endowments of the 16 UNC System campuses. Total endowment assets of those campuses soared 42% from $6.5 billion to $9.2 billion during the year ended June 30, 2021, according to an April report to the UNC System Board of Governors.

The UNC Investment Fund also reported a 42% return in the 2021 fiscal year, reaching a market value of $9.96 billion.

That compares with an average return of 8.5% over the previous four years. While impressive, the endowment at nearby Duke University soared 56% in 2021 to $12.7 billion.

Officials at the UNC fund declined to answer questions, including investment performance over the last nine months and how much each campus has invested with the group.

■ Universities in the investment fund received annual allocations of 3.5% to 4.7% of asset market value over the last five years. Forty-two percent of the distributions in 2021 went to pay for professorships.

■ The fund has distributed $1.5 billion over the last decade, including $183 million last year.

■ The investment fund’s target allocation is 30% long-biased equities, 20% private equity, 15% long/short equity, 10% diversifying strategies, 9% fixed income, 8% real estate, 6% energy and natural resources and 2% cash.

■ The UNC fund’s board of directors includes 16 members, including 14 men and two women. The sole Black director is Michael Kennedy, a senior client partner in Atlanta at the Korn Ferry human resources consultancy.

UNC Investment Fund: Market Value As of June 30, 2021

■ Aside from Chapel Hill and N.C. State, three schools had endowments of more than $200 million: UNC Greensboro ($394 million), UNC Charlotte ($299 million) and East Carolina University ($287 million.)

■ Nearly 28% of the UNC Investment Fund assets were allocated to private equity as of June 30, versus 19% five years earlier. The fund’s private equity portfolio had a 21% annualized return over the last decade, including a 91% gain in 2021.

$ 6.2

■ UNC Investment had $1.1 billion in assets when King arrived in 2005. His predecessor, Mark Yusko, now leads Morgan Creek Capital in Chapel Hill.

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$ 6.7

2017

2018

2019

2020

2021

Asset class returns vs. benchmarks 10 years ending June 30 2021

Annualized return

■ The 91% PE gain included the fund’s venture capital portfolio, which returned 142% “amid a strong IPO market,” according to the fund’s annual report. The fund doesn’t disclose PE funds in which it has investments.

■ The UNC fund is led by CEO Jonathon King, who came to North Carolina in January 2005 after working at Dartmouth College for 16 years. His compensation was about $2.3 million in the 2019 fiscal year, according to the fund’s last public tax filing. Three other fund officials received more than $1 million in compensation.

$ 6.6

$ 5.4

Annualized return

■ UNC Chapel Hill ($5.2 billion) and N.C. State University ($1.95 billion) make up more than 70% of the UNC System endowment assets. The other 14 campuses have a combined $2 billion. The UNC System Office had about $118 million.

$ 9.9

billions

Facts about the fund:

11.1% 9.9%

10.1% 6.5%

6.4% 4.7%

21.3% 16.3%

8.5% 8.8%

Long equity

Long/short equity

Fixed income

Private equity

Real estate

UNC Fund asset class

Benchmark component

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COMMUNITY COLLEGES ALAMANCE COMMUNITY COLLEGE BURLINGTON, GRAHAM, ALAMANCECC.EDU Enrollment: 4,037; contact: 336-506-4270, admissions@alamancecc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 14/1

ASHEVILLE-BUNCOMBE TECHNICAL COMMUNITY COLLEGE

ARDEN, ASHEVILLE, CANDLER, MARSHALL, WOODFIN, ABTECH.EDU Enrollment: 6,601; contact: 828-398-7900, admissions@abtech.edu; student/faculty ratio: 14/1

CALDWELL COMMUNITY COLLEGE AND TECHNICAL INSTITUTE

BOONE, HUDSON, CCCTI.EDU Enrollment: 3,845; contact: Caldwell campus — 828-726-2200, Watauga campus — 828297-3811, ccctiadmissions@cccti.edu; student/faculty ratio: 19/1

CAPE FEAR COMMUNITY COLLEGE

BURGAW, CASTLE HAYNE, HAMPSTEAD, WILMINGTON, CFCC. EDU Enrollment: 8,680; contact: 910-362-7000, admissions@cfcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 14/1

BEAUFORT COUNTY COMMUNITY COLLEGE

CARTERET COMMUNITY COLLEGE

BLADEN COMMUNITY COLLEGE

CATAWBA VALLEY COMMUNITY COLLEGE

WASHINGTON, BEAUFORTCCC.EDU Enrollment: 1,382; contact: 252-946-6194, admissions@beaufortccc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 9/1

DUBLIN, BLADENCC.EDU Enrollment: 1,057; contact: 910-879-5500, bccadmissions@bladencc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 11/1

BLUE RIDGE COMMUNITY COLLEGE

BREVARD, FLAT ROCK, HENDERSONVILLE, BLUERIDGE.EDU Enrollment: 2,399; contact: Transylvania County campus — 828-883-2520, Henderson County campus — 828-694-1800, admissions@blueridge.edu; student/faculty ratio: 13/1

BRUNSWICK COMMUNITY COLLEGE BOLIVIA, LELAND, SOUTHPORT, SUPPLY, BRUNSWICKCC.EDU Enrollment: 1,553; contact: 910-755-7320, admissions@brunswickcc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 10/1

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MOREHEAD CITY, CARTERET.EDU Enrollment: 1,347; contact: 252-222-6154, admissions@email.carteret.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 8/1

CLEVELAND COMMUNITY COLLEGE SHELBY, CLEVELANDCC.EDU Enrollment: 2,269; contact: 704-669-4081, admissions@clevelandcc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 15/1

COASTAL CAROLINA COMMUNITY COLLEGE

JACKSONVILLE, COASTALCAROLINA. EDU Enrollment: 3,571; contact: 910-938-6394, admissions@coastalcarolina.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 14/1

COLLEGE OF THE ALBEMARLE

BARCO, EDENTON, ELIZABETH CITY, MANTEO, ALBEMARLE.EDU Enrollment: 2,508; contact: 252-335-0821, ext.

2290, admissions@albemarle.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 13/1

CRAVEN COMMUNITY COLLEGE

CONOVER, HICKORY, NEWTON, TAYLORSVILLE, CVCC.EDU Enrollment: 4,328; contact: 828-327-7000, ext.

4216, admissions@cvcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 12/1

HAVELOCK, NEW BERN, CRAVENCC. EDU Enrollment: 2,629; contact: New Bern campus — 252-638-7430, Havelock campus — 252-444-2119; admissions@cravencc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 12/1

CENTRAL CAROLINA COMMUNITY COLLEGE

DAVIDSON-DAVIE COMMUNITY COLLEGE

DUNN, LILLINGTON, PITTSBORO, SANFORD, SILER CITY, CCCC.EDU Enrollment: 5,154; contact: Chatham County — 919-545-8000, Harnett County — 910-814-8863, Lee County — 919-718-7300; admissions@ cccc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 13/1

BERMUDA RUN, LEXINGTON, MOCKSVILLE, THOMASVILLE, DAVIDSONDAVIE.EDU Enrollment: 3,765; contact: 336-249-8186, admissions@davidsondavie.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 18/1

CENTRAL PIEDMONT COMMUNITY COLLEGE

DURHAM TECHNICAL COMMUNITY COLLEGE

CHARLOTTE, HUNTERSVILLE, MATTHEWS, CPCC.EDU Enrollment: 16,668; contact: 704-330-2722, fye@cpcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 19/1

DURHAM, HILLSBOROUGH, DURHAMTECH.EDU Enrollment: 4,672; contact: 919-536-7200, ext.

1800, admissions@durhamtech.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 10/1

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EDGECOMBE COMMUNITY COLLEGE

ISOTHERMAL COMMUNITY COLLEGE

ROCKY MOUNT, TARBORO, EDGECOMBE.EDU Enrollment: 1,459; contact: 252-823-5166, admissions@edgecombe.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 11/1

COLUMBUS, RUTHERFORDTON, SPINDALE, ISOTHERMAL.EDU Enrollment: 2,042; contact: 828-395-4193, admissions@isothermal.edu; student/faculty ratio: 12/1

FAYETTEVILLE TECHNICAL COMMUNITY COLLEGE

FAYETTEVILLE, FORT BRAGG, SPRING LAKE, FAYTECHCC.EDU Enrollment: 10,932; contact: 910-500-0089, admissions@faytechcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 16/1

FORSYTH TECHNICAL COMMUNITY COLLEGE

KERNERSVILLE, KING, WALNUT COVE, WINSTON-SALEM, FORSYTHTECH.EDU Enrollment: 7,587; contact: 336-734-7556, admissions@forsythtech.edu; student/faculty ratio: 12/1

GASTON COLLEGE

JAMES SPRUNT COMMUNITY COLLEGE

KENANSVILLE, JAMESSPRUNT.EDU Enrollment: 1,202; contact: 910-275-6364, wedwards@jamessprunt.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 9/1

JOHNSTON COMMUNITY COLLEGE

CLAYTON, FOUR OAKS, SMITHFIELD, JOHNSTONCC.EDU Enrollment: 4,182; contact: 919-209-2128, jccadmissions@johnstoncc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 10/1

LENOIR COMMUNITY COLLEGE

BELMONT, DALLAS, LINCOLNTON, GASTON.EDU Enrollment: 5,345; contact: 704.922.6232, admissions@gaston.edu; student/faculty ratio: 11/1

KINSTON, LA GRANGE, PINK HILL, SNOW HILL, TRENTON, LENOIRCC. EDU Enrollment: 2,361; contact: 252-527-6223, krhill01@lenoircc.edu, dostroud89@lenoircc. edu; student/faculty ratio: 13/1

GUILFORD TECHNICAL COMMUNITY COLLEGE

MARTIN COMMUNITY COLLEGE

COLFAX, GREENSBORO, HIGH POINT, JAMESTOWN, GTCC.EDU Enrollment: 10,821; contact: 336-334-4822, ext. 31125, admissions@gtcc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 18/1

HALIFAX COMMUNITY COLLEGE

WELDON, HALIFAXCC.EDU Enrollment: 988; contact: 252-536-2551, admissions@halifaxcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 11/1

HAYWOOD COMMUNITY COLLEGE

CLYDE, HAYWOOD.EDU Enrollment: 1,440; contact: 828-627-4500, enrollment@haywood.edu; student/faculty ratio: 8/1

WILLIAMSTON, WINDSOR, MARTINCC.EDU Enrollment: 944; contact: 252-789-0268, admissions@martincc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 11/1

MAYLAND COMMUNITY COLLEGE

BURNSVILLE, NEWLAND, SPRUCE PINE, MAYLAND.EDU Enrollment: 441; contact: 828-766-1234, admissions@mayland.edu; student/faculty ratio: 13/1

MCDOWELL TECHNICAL COMMUNITY COLLEGE

MARION, MCDOWELLTECH.EDU Enrollment: 1,048; contact: 828-659-0444, 828652-0622, admissions@go.mcdowelltech. edu; student/faculty ratio: 8/1

Endowment balances UNC System endowments - 2021

UNC Chapel Hill $5 billion

N.C. State $2 billion

UNC Greensboro $390 million

UNC Charlotte $300 million

East Carolina University $290 million

Appalachian State University $175 million

N.C. A&T State University $170 million

UNC Wilmington $148 million

Western Carolina University $125 million

UNC School of the Arts $120 million

UNC Asheville $65 million

N.C. Central University $51 million

Winston-Salem State University $50 million

Fayetteville State University $25 million

UNC Pembroke $25 million

Elizabeth City State University $8 million

source: The University of North Carolina System

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MITCHELL COMMUNITY COLLEGE

ROANOKE-CHOWAN COMMUNITY COLLEGE

MOORESVILLE, STATESVILLE, MITCHELLCC.EDU Enrollment: 3,373; contact: 704-978-5493, admissions@mitchellcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 21/1

AHOSKIE, ROANOKECHOWAN.EDU Enrollment: 525; contact: 252-862-1248, rsaxby@roanokechowan.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 11/1

ROBESON COMMUNITY COLLEGE

MONTGOMERY COMMUNITY COLLEGE

LUMBERTON, ROBESON.EDU Enrollment: 1,828; contact: 910-272-3342, admissions@robeson.edu; student/faculty ratio: 16/1

TROY, MONTGOMERY.EDU Enrollment: 679; contact: 910-898-9617, lathamj@montgomery.edu.; student/faculty ratio: 8/1

ROCKINGHAM COMMUNITY COLLEGE

NASH COMMUNITY COLLEGE

WENTWORTH, ROCKINGHAMCC.EDU Enrollment: 1,922; contact: 336.342.4261, ext. 2333, admissions@rockinghamcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 13/1

ROCKY MOUNT, NASHCC.EDU Enrollment: 2,623; contact: 252-451-8263, admissions@nashcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 20/1

ROWAN-CABARRUS COMMUNITY COLLEGE

PAMLICO COMMUNITY COLLEGE

CONCORD, KANNAPOLIS, SALISBURY, RCCC.EDU Enrollment: 7,109; contact: 704-216-7222, admissions@rccc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 18/1

BAYBORO, GRANTSBORO, PAMLICOCC.EDU Enrollment: 362; contact: 252-249-1851, ext.

3014, cwarner@pamlicocc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 5/1

SAMPSON COMMUNITY COLLEGE

PIEDMONT COMMUNITY COLLEGE

CLINTON, SAMPSONCC.EDU Enrollment: 1,492; contact: 910-900-4319, admissions@sampsoncc.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 10/1

ROXBORO, YANCEYVILLE, PIEDMONTCC.EDU Enrollment: 1,329; contact: Person County — 336-599-1181, Caswell County — 336-6945707; student/ faculty ratio: 13/1

SANDHILLS COMMUNITY COLLEGE

PITT COMMUNITY COLLEGE WINTERVILLE, PITTCC.EDU Enrollment: 7,688; contact: 252-493-7232, pittadm@email.pittcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 18/1

RANDOLPH COMMUNITY COLLEGE

SOUTHEASTERN COMMUNITY COLLEGE

ASHEBORO, RANDOLPH.EDU Enrollment: 2,548; contact: 336-633-0200, rccreg@randolph.edu; student/faculty ratio: 9/1

RICHMOND COMMUNITY COLLEGE

HAMLET, LAURINBURG, RICHMONDCC.EDU Enrollment: 2,226; contact: main campus — 910-410-1700, Scotland County campus —910-410-1831; student/faculty ratio: 11/1

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PINEHURST, CARTHAGE, RAEFORD, ROBBINS, SANDHILLS.EDU Enrollment: 3,990; contact: 910-695-3725, sccadmissions@sandhills.edu; student/ faculty ratio: 13/1

WHITEVILLE, SCCNC.EDU Enrollment: 1,271; contact: 910-788-6279, admission@sccnc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 12/1

SOUTH PIEDMONT COMMUNITY COLLEGE

MONROE, POLKTON, WADESBORO, SPCC.EDU Enrollment: 3,019; contact: L.L. Polk campus — 704-272-5300, Lockhart-Taylor Center — 704-272-5400, Old Charlotte Highway campus — 704-290-5100, recruitment@spcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 14/1

SOUTHWESTERN COMMUNITY COLLEGE

SYLVA, SOUTHWESTERNCC.EDU Enrollment: 2,259; contact: 800-447-4091, 828-339-4352 or 828-339-4253, admissions@ southwesterncc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 10/1

STANLY COMMUNITY COLLEGE

ALBEMARLE, LOCUST, STANLY.EDU Enrollment: 2,432; contact: Albemarle campus — 704-982-0121, Crutchfield Education Center — 704-888-8848, sccadmissions@stanly.edu; student/faculty ratio: 12/1

SURRY COMMUNITY COLLEGE

DOBSON, ELKIN, MOUNT AIRY, PILOT MOUNTAIN, YADKINVILLE, SURRY. EDU Enrollment: 3,103; contact: 336-386-3218, admissions@surry.edu; student/faculty ratio: 14/1

TRI-COUNTY COMMUNITY COLLEGE

MARBLE, MURPHY, ROBBINSVILLE, TRICOUNTYCC.EDU Enrollment: 991; contact: 828-835-4213, admissions@tricountycc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 14/1

VANCE-GRANVILLE COMMUNITY COLLEGE

CREEDMOOR, HENDERSON, LOUISBURG, WARRENTON, VGCC. EDU Enrollment: 2,963; contact: 252-738-3327, records@vgcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 14/1

WAKE TECHNICAL COMMUNITY COLLEGE

CARY, MORRISVILLE, RALEIGH, WAKE FOREST, WENDELL, ZEBULON, WAKETECH.EDU Enrollment: 21,760; contact: 919-866-5420, admissions@waketech.edu; student/faculty ratio: 18/1

WAYNE COMMUNITY COLLEGE

GOLDSBORO, WAYNECC.EDU Enrollment: 2,701; contact: 919-739-6720, 919739-6719, wcc-admissions@waynecc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 12/1

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WESTERN PIEDMONT COMMUNITY COLLEGE

WILKES COMMUNITY COLLEGE

MORGANTON, WPCC.EDU Enrollment: 1,792; contact: 828-448-3500, applications@wpcc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 10/1

SPARTA, WEST JEFFERSON, WILKESBORO, WILKESCC.EDU Enrollment: 2,435; contact: 336-838-6509, mbstaley687@wilkescc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 8/1

Most popular

in 20-21 school year

degree programs

16%

WILSON, WILSONCC.EDU Enrollment: 1,862; contact: 252-291-1195, admissions@wilsoncc.edu; student/faculty ratio: 11/1 Enrollment data compiled from National Center for Education Statistics, nces.ed.gov; contact info from college websites

UNC System Degrees conferred

bachelor’s Business, management, marketing

WILSON COMMUNITY COLLEGE

bachelors

44,309

master’s

13,306

doctoral

2,810

Most popular master’s programs - UNC System - 2021 (ranked by degree count)

Business 3,050 Education 2,007 Public administration 1,995

Health professions

12%

Health professions 1,777 Computer/information services 1,142 Engineering 1,080

Most popular doctoral programs - UNC System - 2021 (ranked by degree count)

Biological/ biomedical sciences

7%

Health professions 1,036 Legal professions 293 Engineering 285 Education 244

Social science

6%

Biological/biomedical sciences 189 Agriculture/veterinary science 132

Change in UNC enrollment from 2012-2021 % change from 2021

Black.....51,200

Engineering

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10.6%

Hispanic or Latino...... 20,186

109%

Asian.....12,056

61.7%

White.....133,202

(-0.1%)

Other...... 27,865

24.5%

Total.....244,500

10.6%

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MBA PROGRAMS

2022

COLLEGE OR UNIVERSITY

SCHOOL

DEAN/DIRECTOR

LOCATION

WEBSITE

APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY*

Walker College of Business

Sandra Vannoy

Boone, online

business.appstate.edu

BARTON COLLEGE

School of Business

Ronald E. Eggers

Wilson

barton.edu/graduate/master-of-businessadministration/

CAMPBELL UNIVERSITY†

Lundy-Fetterman School of Business

Kevin O’Mara

Buies Creek, Raleigh, online

business.campbell.edu

CAROLINA UNIVERSITY

Patterson School of Business

Winston-Salem, online

business.carolinau.edu/

DEVRY UNIVERSITY†

Keller Graduate School of Management

Charlotte, online

devry.edu

DUKE UNIVERSITY*

Fuqua School of Business

Bill Boulding

Durham, global locations

fuqua.duke.edu

EAST CAROLINA UNIVERSITY*

College of Business

Paul Schwager

Greenville, online

business.ecu.edu

ELON UNIVERSITY*

Martha & Spencer Love School of Business

Raghu Tadepalli

Elon, Research Triangle Park

elon.edu/u/academics/business/mba/

FAYETTEVILLE STATE UNIVERSITY*

Broadwell College of Business and Economics

Ulysses Taylor

Fayetteville, online

uncfsu.edu

GARDNER-WEBB UNIVERSITY†

Godbold School of Business

Mischia A. Taylor

Boiling Springs, Charlotte, online

gardner-webb.edu/programs/businessadministration-mba/

HIGH POINT UNIVERSITY

Earl N. Phillips School of Business

Daniel Hall

High Point, online

highpoint.edu/graduate/mba

LENOIR-RHYNE COLLEGE†

Charles M. Snipes School of Business & Economics

David Jones

Asheville, Hickory, online

lr.edu/mba

MEREDITH COLLEGE*

School of Business

Kimberly Burke

Raleigh

meredith.edu/mba

MONTREAT COLLEGE

School of Adult & Graduate Studies

Paul Gratton

Asheville, Charlotte, online

montreat.edu/mba

N.C. A&T STATE UNIVERSITY*

Wille A. Deese College of Business and Economics

Kevin James

Greensboro, online

ncat.edu/cobe/mba/index.php

N.C. CENTRAL UNIVERSITY*

School of Business

Anthony C. Nelson

Durham, online

nccu.edu/business

N.C. STATE UNIVERSITY*

Jenkins Graduate School/Poole College of Management Frank A. Buckless

Raleigh, RTP, online

mba.ncsu.edu

NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY

D’Amore-McKim School of Business

Emery Trahan

Charlotte, online

northeastern.edu/charlotte

Susan Luck

Charlotte, online

pfeiffer.edu/mba

Rick Mathieu

Charlotte, online

queens.edu/mba

Wayne Freeman

Online

sa.edu/master-of-business-administration/

PFEIFFER UNIVERSITY† QUEENS UNIVERSITY*

McColl School of Business

ST. ANDREWS UNIVERSITY STRAYER UNIVERSITY†

Charlotte, Greensboro, Morrisville, Raleigh strayer.edu

UNC CHAPEL HILL*

Kenan-Flagler Business School

Douglas Shackelford Chapel Hill, Charlotte, online

kenan-flagler.unc.edu

UNC CHARLOTTE*

Belk College of Business

Jennifer L. Troyer

Charlotte, online

mba.uncc.edu

UNC GREENSBORO*

Bryan School of Business and Economics

McRae Banks

Greensboro, online

bryan.uncg.edu

UNC PEMBROKE*

Thomas School of Business

Susan Peters

Online

uncp.edu/mba

UNC WILMINGTON*

Cameron School of Business

Robert Burrus

Online

csb.uncw.edu/grad/index.html

UNIVERSITY OF MOUNT OLIVE

Robert L. Tillman School of Business

Kathy T. Best

Online

umo.edu/mba

WAKE FOREST UNIVERSITY*

School of Business

Michelle Roehm

Charlotte, Winston-Salem , online

business.wfu.edu/mba

WESTERN CAROLINA UNIVERSITY*

College of Business

Angela “AJ” Grube

Asheville, online

wcu.edu

WINGATE UNIVERSITY

Porter B. Byrum School of Business

Sergio Castello

Charlotte

WINSTON-SALEM STATE UNIVERSITY

School of Business

Online

wingate.edu/graduate-programs/master-ofbusiness-administration wssu.edu/admissions/programs/businessadministration-mba/index.html

MBA PROGRAMS 2022 *accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business †accredited by the Accreditation Council for Business Schools and Programs

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N.C. A&T State University is poised to become a top-level research university under Harold Martin Sr., who became chancellor at the Greensboro campus in 2006.

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PHOTOS COURTESY OF NC A&T STATE UNIVERSITY

BY EDWARD MARTIN e rubs shoulders with Gov. Roy Cooper, snipping a wide gold ribbon while faculty members, Greensboro townspeople and industry executives cheer. Some chant, “Aggie Pride!”

This, says the lanky, one-time standout on the basketball court in a ribbon-matching yellow tie, symbolizes “possibilities for the future.”

The new, $90 million, glass-walled building behind him bears his name. It’s the Harold L. Martin Sr. Engineering Research & Innovation Complex.

When the longtime chancellor of North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University finishes speaking, guests at the February grand opening wander through a lab where a robot hoists 40-pound loads with remarkably human-like movements, accompanied by Spot, a mechanical dog.

In another lab filled with virtual-reality mechanisms, holographics and other technology, the guests hobnob with scientists developing safety technology required if autonomous vehicles take over the nation’s highways.

On a quieter day in a more modest lab, an A&T researcher surrounded by petri dishes and microscopes works with far less fanfare.

Over the years, Jianmei Yu has developed hypoallergenic peanuts, strains that permit millions with potentially deadly allergic reactions to eat them. The research creates potential use of peanut derivatives in hundreds of products.

The Chinese-born scientist with a Ph.D from Louisiana State University also has developed varieties that don’t become rancid after roasting, enabling more use of peanut flour to help fight world hunger. She’s also experimenting with new strains of corn that resist potentially poisonous mold. Her efforts could expand markets for Tar Heel farmers, who produce $900 million a year in corn and peanuts.

Yu smiles at parallels among herself, A&T and George Washington Carver, who, in the late 1800s, developed scores of uses for peanuts, urging cotton-poor Southern farmers to switch crops. Carver was based at another historically Black college, Tuskegee Institute in Alabama.

“Our lab is small, and we don’t always have the best equipment,” she shrugs. “But we do the very best we can.”

Today, 131 years after the university’s founding, the Martin complex underscores A&T’s rising-star status as an increasingly influential center for engineering education in North Carolina and nationally. It’s not a coincidence that President Joe Biden gave a major economic talk at the site in April.

The new building follows a $6 million agricultural research pavilion that opened at A&T’s 492-acre research farm last year and a $90 million student union that debuted two years earlier.

Enrollment swelled 26.3% in the past decade to more than 13,300 students, making it the nation’s largest historically Black university and the third-fastest growing of the state’s public universities. The system overall grew 10% during the same time.

Fundraising also tells the tale; A&T raised nearly $94 million in the 2021 fiscal year, compared with $18 million a year earlier. That included $45 million from philanthropist MacKenzie Scott, whose ex-husband is Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

The balance comes from individuals and institutions, including $5 million from Walmart and $5.5 million from Corning, both targeting science and technology programs.

It was a record annual haul for an HBCU, officials say, and put the university’s endowment at $157.5 million. That compares with $28 million a decade ago.

The momentum has A&T on the verge of being classified as a Research One Doctoral University under the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education framework, joining Duke University, UNC Chapel Hill and N.C. State University, says UNC System President Peter Hans.

▲ A&T State University enrolls more than 13,300 students, the most it has seen ever over 130 years.

“That’s important in higher education not only because it indicates the level of degrees — doctorates, master’s, bachelor’s — but the level of research at an institution,” he says. Research One institutions typically attract highly regarded professors who, in turn, lure greater funding and notoriety.

Moreover, A&T would be the first historically Black university to be classified as R1.

A&T already plays a valuable role in Tar Heel economic recruitment, similar to how Stanford University helps feed intellectual capital to Silicon Valley industries. “These days,” says Brent Christensen, CEO of Greensboro Chamber of Commerce, “talent is the new currency in economic development.”

Last summer, Christensen asked Chancellor Martin and A&T College of Engineering Dean Robin Coger to meet with out-of-town visitors involved in the secret Project Darwin.

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▲ On move-in-day, Chancellor Martin has helped new freshmen move into their residence halls..

Over lunch at Grandover Resort and Spa, university officials described their efforts to boost science, technology, engineering and math programs and success in graduating more Black engineers than any other U.S. university.

The guests listened politely. Project Darwin was Toyota Motor Corp’s plan for a $1.3 billion, 1,750-employee electricvehicle battery plant in nearby Randolph County. Coger has since been named provost at East Carolina University, starting in July.

“A&T was key,” says Randolph County Commission Chair Darrell Frye, who helped recruit Toyota. “Their engineering school in particular helped Toyota tick off one of their must-haves.”

For generations, A&T’s future was far from dazzling. It’s been an uphill grind for the school and its rambling campus of redbrick buildings in east Greensboro. Like its HBCU counterparts in the UNC System — Elizabeth City State University, Fayetteville State, N.C. Central and Winston-Salem State — A&T has been a refuge for students from mostly Black public schools that, in some cases, left them ill-prepared for higher education.

North Carolina Agricultural and Mechanical College for the Colored Race was founded under a federal land-grant mandate in 1891 because Black Tar Heel residents had no college to attend and their futures were limited mostly to farming, teaching,

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nursing and menial jobs, says Rodney Dawson, a community historian at the Greensboro Museum. A&T quickly became the center of the Gate City’s Black middle and upper class.

The institution opened only seven years before the Wilmington Massacre, when a mob of 2,000 white supremacists burned Black businesses and homes, killing 60 and sending hundreds fleeing from the Port City. A&T’s second chancellor, James B. Dudley, was a Wilmington native who had taken the reins in 1896, two years before the massacre.

A&T was also born into the state’s Jim Crow politics. Northerners Ceasar and Moses Cone moved denim-maker Cone Mills to Greensboro in 1891, when most Tar Heel Black people were sharecroppers and farm laborers. Cone factories hired them for mill jobs that provided more stability but often came with inferior wages and dangerous work.

Unwittingly, Cone and other mills helped A&T morph into the present.

“We went from an agricultural school in the ‘20s, ‘30s and ‘40s to more industrial training,” says Dawson, who is an A&T graduate. “Mills and plants needed engineers who could help them restructure, and A&T students knew if they couldn’t find a job here in Greensboro, they could go to Charlotte or Richmond or somewhere else.”

A neighborhood of small houses and mobile homes a dozen blocks north of the A&T campus makes up what was once one of Cone Mills’ segregated mill villages. Its centerpiece is the im-

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maculately restored East White Oak Community Center, which was built as a school for Black mill children in the early 1900s.

On A&T’s campus, a bigger-than-life bronze statue honors the four A&T freshmen who, in February 1960, began a sit-in at the local F.W. Woolworth whites-only lunch counter. The movement spread nationwide. By July, Woolworth was seating Blacks at its lunch counters nationwide.

Some historians say the 19-year-old students were acting mainly on their own, with little encouragement from A&T. Chancellor W.T. Gibbs defended them, saying, “We teach our students how to think, not what to think.” He took a hands-off approach, not uncommon for HBCU leaders during the civil rights era.

“The attitude was heads down; don’t be too aggressive, because the legislature could cut funds even more,” Dawson says.

Other civil rights leaders emerged from A&T, including Jesse Jackson, a 1964 graduate who was student body president. He became a two-time presidential candidate.

The historic inequity of funding of A&T and other HBCUs has drawn attention in recent years. “The case of HBCUs is clear and obvious,” Hans says. “But for them to have an overdue moment is not sufficient to right all historical wrongs.”

A Forbes story in February concluded that HBCUs nationwide have been underfunded by more than $12 billion between 1987 and 2020, based on the disparity in per-student funding with land-grant institutions. It cited A&T as the prime example, contending it received $2.8 billion less over the years than N.C. State, which is among the nation’s top-ranked engineering and agricultural research institutions.

Hans, president of the UNC System, didn’t dispute the research but cautions that such figures can be misleading.

Research funding in universities comes from a wide variety of public and private sources, and N.C. State’s enrollment of about 36,000 students is nearly triple that of A&T. Moreover, the UNC System has provided greater per-pupil instructional expenses to N.C. State and UNC Chapel Hill than the other 14 campuses, reflecting higher costs, history and other factors that have long favored the two flagship schools.

The difference between A&T and N.C. State was about $8,000 per student in 2020, Forbes noted.

N.C. lawmakers have taken notice, providing an additional $11 million to A&T this year to support doctoral programs and research. The UNC System now allows A&T to admit as many as 25% of its students from out of state, compared with 18% at most campuses. Out-of-state students pay higher tuition, which aids the university’s finances.

North Carolina’s unrivaled commitment to HBCUs raises the question of how they fit in a society that some believe should be focused on becoming colorblind. Three miles west of A&T is UNC Greensboro, which has been led since 2015 by Franklin Gilliam, a former UCLA dean, who is Black. He has emphasized diversity and helped make UNCG a national leader in helping students from lower-income households improve their economic status.

“If everything were as it should be, there would be no HBCUs

or TWIs,” says Tyrone Couey, president of the 106-college National HBCU Alumni Foundation in Silver Spring, Maryland. TWIs are traditionally white institutions. “Unfortunately, it isn’t. Without HBCUs like A&T there would be no Michael Regans or Kamala Harrises.”

Despite decades of academic integration, Courey adds, A&T still underscores the value of HBCU. Half of its students are the first in their families to attend college, just like Goldsboro native Zeb Regan, a Vietnam War veteran and former agricultural extension agent who earned a degree in 1969.

“I chose A&T because of its rich history,” says his son, Michael Regan, administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. “But most importantly my father was the first member of his family to graduate from a four-year college, and I still look up to him. He’s my mentor.”

Virtually everyone familiar with A&T stresses the key to its resurgence is its highly regarded chancellor.

Harold Martin, 71, grew up in a down-at-the-heels neighborhood in neighboring Winston-Salem, the son of a truck driver for a meatpacking company who doubled as an itinerant preacher. The family traveled Carolina back roads from one rural church to another, dining on lunches packed by his mother, a domestic for a white family. “We were really poor,” though better off than some neighbors, he says.

The family avoided restaurants and drove long hours to return home rather than seek out the rare hotels that would admit Blacks.

Martin graduated from a segregated high school in 1970 and passed up a chance to play basketball at Ohio Wesleyan University to enter A&T’s engineering school. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees there, then received a Ph.D. in electrical engineering at Virginia Tech University in 1980. He later returned to the Greensboro campus to teach and was the engineering dean from 1989 to 1994, then a vice chancellor for five years.

He moved to Winston-Salem State as chancellor from 2000 to 2006, helping boost enrollment as it recorded a 70-plus point increase in average SAT scores for incoming freshmen. In 2006, UNC System President Erskine Bowles promoted him to oversee academic affairs for the entire system, then named him to the A&T post in 2009. He’s the first alumnus to hold the job.

Soon after taking office, Martin introduced A&T Preeminence 2020, a plan to increase research, enrollment and academic scores for incoming students. Many goals have been achieved even as more than half of students qualify for federal financial aid.

This coming fall, first-year students will have an average GPA of 3.7, slightly higher than the national average for all colleges. “We set our minds 12 years ago to go toe-to-toe with other great universities, and that has paid off,” says university spokesperson Todd Simmons.

Martin also is raising the school’s athletic ambitions. After leaving the HBCU-dominated Mid-Eastern Athletic Confer-

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ence for the Big South Conference in 2020, A&T is moving to the higher-profile Colonial Athletic Association in July. Elon University and UNC Wilmington are Colonial members. Martin says A&T expects to be “competitive, not just a member.”

Regan was secretary of the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality for four years before going to Washington last year. He calls Martin the best chancellor in A&T’s history.

“When I graduated from high school in Goldsboro, my guidance counselors encouraged me not to go to an HBCU, because they perceived them as less competitive than white colleges,” he says. “Not only is A&T competitive now, but companies like Google and Apple know it’s the largest source of Black engineers in the world. It has an excellent nursing program, and they just announced a Ph.D. program in environmental science.”

Regan initially was more interested in fun than studies. “I lived in Scott Hall and enjoyed dorm life, hanging out in The Yard, Gym Jam and all the parties,” he says. “I was cruising at a level I thought was adequate. I changed my major a couple of times.”

Professor Godfrey Uzochukwu stepped in. “He saw in me someone who needed to exercise more discipline. He ran me through the paces and never let up, but he cared about me and invested in me as an individual.” Regan earned a bachelor’s degree in earth and environmental science in 1998 and now helps the U.S. combat climate change.

Martin’s emphases include caring for students, according to several faculty members, administrators and students.

“We recognize freshmen might not have the support systems at home, so that welcoming nature is quite relevant,” says Sanjiv Sarin, a special assistant to the chancellor. “We’re not a liberal arts college, and [Martin] constantly reminds us that first and foremost we’re a land-grant university. We’re focused.

Our mission is to constantly find ways to benefit our students and communities.”

Sarin is in his 39th year.

This is Levi Burks’ first.

The 18-year-old from Westerville, Ohio, visited UNC Chapel Hill, the University of Cincinnati and other schools before choosing A&T. She’s studying to become a civil rights lawyer and chose A&T because of its HBCU status.

Another first-year nursing major, Kalia Coleman, a 19-yearold track athlete and honors student from Dumfries, Virginia, chose A&T for the same reason.

“It’s like a home away from home,” says Coleman. She calls the academic environment “safe, supportive. I can confidently say the teachers, the atmosphere is different here.”

Both students say they wrestle with sensitive racial issues that experts say are endemic to the nation’s HBCUs. Burks struggles with her admiration for her father, a police officer, and the tug of the Black Lives Matter movement and protests over police-involved violence. She and Coleman attended predominantly white high schools where racism — some subtle, some not — made them uncomfortable.

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The Aggie account Fast facts about N.C. A&T State University Fall 2021 enrollment Admission rate UNC System admission rate

13,322 57% 62%

Average SAT math score

1098 (2021)

UNC System average SAT math score

1170 (2020)

Average high school GPA

3.7

Average UNC System high school GPA

3.8

Percentage of Pell Grant recipients

55%

Average UNC System Pell Grant recipients

35%

Percentage of Black undergraduates at A&T

83%

Percentage of Black undergraduates in UNC System

21%

source: UNC System; SAT scores are not required for UNC System admission

“I was a high-achieving student, and my teachers would seem surprised,” Coleman says. “If I got a B and was mad at myself for not getting an A, the teachers just shrugged. That’s not the case here.”

Concerns that HBCUs perpetuate voluntary resegregation are more than offset by other benefits, says Hans, who himself is a first-generation college graduate. “They’re supportive, and their economic impact today is clear.”

Late October annually brings homecoming week to Greensboro, typically drawing 40,000 alums for steppin’ performances, marching bands, concerts and the homecoming football game.

Merchants say its economic impact exceeds $20 million.

It’s called GHOE, for “Greatest Homecoming on Earth,” a title that fits, Michael Regan and others say.

“It’s real,” Burks says. “Everywhere I go, people are shouting, ‘Aggie pride.’” ■

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The nation’s oldest continually operated women’s college opts for a bold new direction.

BY EBONY L. MORMAN

PHOTO COURTESY OF SALEM COLLEGE AND ACADEMY

T

he concept that girls and women should undertake a vigorous education wasn’t a prevailing theme in colonial America when Salem Academy and College opened in 1772. UNC Chapel Hill, the first public university in the U.S., admitted students in 1795 but didn’t enroll women in a regular academic year until 1897.

However, the fundamental tenet of empowering women still drives the Winston-Salem institution as it celebrates its 250th anniversary.

President Summer Johnson McGee, who joined Salem last July, is aiming to revitalize the women’s college and boarding school for high school girls by changing its focus to an exclusive emphasis on health-related fields and academic and co-curricular experiences concentrating on science, technology, engineering and math.

Like many small private colleges, Salem faces a battle for survival as U.S. high school graduations plateau. Declining enrollment over the past decade pressured its $20 million annual budget, which put its accreditation at risk in 2018.

The turmoil prompted Salem’s board of trustees to reassess the school’s prospects and launch a $10 million capital campaign that raised $14 million. That success prompted the accreditation agency to remove Salem from financial probation in 2019.

Trustees concluded that bold changes were needed at the college, leading to McGee’s hiring. Her work as founding dean of the School of Health Sciences at the University of New Haven in 2018 resulted in more than a dozen new in-person and virtual academic programs at the private, 7,000-student Connecticut campus.

“The opportunity to reimagine a 250-year-old institution and to set it up on a course for success was just an irresistible opportunity,” McGee says. “That’s how I ended up here at Salem. I have really enjoyed getting to become part of a really great community.”

Studies show many aspiring college students are interested in health-related careers, McGee says. Indeed, about 40% of Salem’s student body was already pursuing a degree in a science, technology or health-related major.

Salem College has a goal of boosting its current enrollment of about 500 students to 850 over the next three years, McGee says. The college received about 1,200 applications for the 2022-23 academic year. In May 2017, Salem reported enrollment of 1,200. Salem Academy, a boarding and day school, which also operates on the 47-acre campus near downtown WinstonSalem, has about 60 to 80 students. Salem’s endowment is about $70 million.

New opportunities added at Salem include majors in Health Sciences, Health Humanities, Health Communication and

▲ President Summer Johnson McGee joined Salem College last July.

Health Advocacy/Humanitarian Systems.

“We really thought about what was the way that Salem graduates could make the biggest impact in the world,” McGee says.

“So, thinking about making communities healthier, making the lives of individuals better, making that change — that’s what Salem has always been about.”

The institution wants to develop more partnerships with health systems, pharmaceutical companies, and life sciences researchers to develop internships, scholarships, and career opportunities, she says.

When Salem hired McGee, search committee chair Elizabeth Baird called her “uniquely qualified to help lead Salem Academy and College into the next 250 years,” citing her success at New Haven as evidence of an ability to transform the N.C. school.

Baird is a Salem alumna who also chairs the school’s board of trustees and is director of the North Carolina Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores.

McGee earned a bachelor’s degrees in philosophy and bioethics from Indiana University Bloomington in her home state in 2003, then received a Ph.D. in bioethics and health policy at Johns Hopkins University’s Bloomberg School of Public Health in 2006.

She worked at Loyola University in Chicago for six years before moving to New Haven in 2013.

Leading Salem offers an added bonus of promoting single-sex education, which McGee says has long been one of her passions.

Surviving for 250 years reflects a steadfast commitment by students, faculty, staff and alumni “who have continued to support Salem through thick and through thin all of these years,” McGee says. “There are increasingly fewer and fewer institutions in the country that really are wholly dedicated to creating that empowering, learning and leadership development environment for women.” ■ M A Y

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Gray power Retirement living options abound across North Carolina, attracting newcomers and hefty investments from corporations and not-for-profit housing groups.

A

BY SHANNON CUTHRELL

ttracting people to move to Brunswick Forest, a master-planned community near Wilmington for adults age 55 and older, isn’t overly challenging these days. Hordes of retiring baby boomers and others long for the coastal lifestyle. Fifty lots sold in January, 20 more than in a typical month.

President Jerry Helms says he expects 400 to 500 sales this year.

Unfortunately, getting homes built on those lots is frustrating Helms. The typical sixmonth construction process now stretches to nine or 10 months because of worker shortages and delays in deliveries of windows, doors and appliances.

“As soon as we get new lots on the ground, our builders are starting homes, and those homes are selling before they’re ever complete,” Helms says. “It’s a great problem to have, but if we had stock on the shelves, so to speak, and weren’t selling just-in-time inventory, we could really have 500 to 600 sales per year.”

“When a builder has to wait 22 weeks for a window to go into a home,” he adds, “that slows the whole process down.”

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PHOTOS COURTESY OF BRUNSWICK FOREST

Started in 2007, Brunswick Forest is now one of the state’s fastest-growing communities, with an expected 8,000 homes when completed over the next decade. It is part of the boom-time experienced by North Carolina’s senior housing industry, which ranges from quaint villas and neighborhoods built for active retirees to nursing homes and health care-centered options for seniors requiring more hands-on attention.

With a diverse geography of beaches and mountains, a moderate climate and a pivotal location bridging the North and South, North Carolina is a favorite choice for many retirees across the nation. The Census Bureau estimates that 639,000 more people moved to the state than left between 2010 and 2019, which is more than in any neighboring state.

Coupled with internal growth, demand for senior housing looks to be a long-term trend. North Carolina’s 65-plus population is expected to grow by 56% by 2035, while the number of 85-plus residents will more than double, according to N.C. State Demographer Michael Cline. The state already has 2.1 million residents who are at least age 65, up from 1.2 million in 2010. More than 110,000 North Carolinians turn 65 years old annually.

A low cost of living, access to medical care and tax-friendly policies are the top reasons retirees move to the state, says Andre Nabors, partner relations manager at Visit North Carolina, the state’s tourism promotion agency. Meanwhile, senior housing providers are finding success with activeadult developments across the state.

“They promote that you will have an instant friend group of like-minded people of the same age. These are residents that have all moved from other places, had their children leave home and are looking to enjoy their golden years,” Nabors says. “The coastal region is still the primary destination, but the mountains and Asheville region, as well as urban areas like Charlotte and Raleigh, are still popular. Outlier towns are becoming important because of their proximity to major cities, health care and amenities.”

A big part of the senior housing landscape is the 62 statelicensed, continuing-care retirement communities, which generally include independent living, assisted-living, and skilled nursing care and services. CCRCs house about 22,000 residents, according to Raleigh-based LeadingAge North Carolina, an association representing about 70 senior living communities.

Over the next decade or so, those numbers are expected to increase to more than 35,000 residents, according to a 2015 study by UNC Chapel Hill’s Kenan Institute of Private Enterprise. The communities, of which about 40 are owned by not-for-profit groups, pay about $174 million in annual state and local taxes and $283 million in federal levies and employ more than 10,000 workers.

Five new continuing-care communities are under development in Asheville, Charlotte, Hendersonville and Raleigh, while a dozen others are expanding, according to the N.C. Department of Insurance.

The senior housing landscape encompasses everything from retirement communities, independent living centers, and assisted living facilities to nursing homes, adult-care homes, and memory-care homes. Many of the nation’s leading senior housing providers are heavily invested in North Carolina, including Brookdale Senior Living, Sunrise Senior Living and PulteGroup, which owns the Del Webb communities.

While those for-profits have a substantial market share, nonprofits were dominant until the 1990s, says David Segmiller, principal at the Charlotte office of the Hord Coplan Macht architecture firm. The state’s Methodist, Lutheran and Presbyterian denominations started more than 20 communities across North Carolina.

▲ Brunswick Forest is about a 10 minute drive to historic downtown Wilmington.

“It’s a much bigger industry and more connected than a lot of people understand,” says Segmiller, who has worked with senior-housing developers for more than three decades. Early to the scene was Charlotte’s Aldersgate United Methodist Retirement Community, which started in the 1940s as a place for retired Methodist preachers and widows. Now, the 231acre campus totals about 560 residents and provides at-home services, assisted living, memory care, long-term care and rehabilitation services. It reported $41 million in revenue in 2020, according to its latest state disclosure statement.

“There weren’t a lot of for-profit developers doing it aside from ‘mom and pop’-type providers that had one assisted living community, maybe two,” Segmiller says. “Then Sunrise entered the market and started building all over the country, and other developers copied that. A lot of money in realestate investment trusts made it into the business.”

Limits to growth Senior housing in North Carolina would be developing even faster if not for labor shortages and regulatory issues, industry observers stress. In March, The Charlotte Observer produced a report noting that only one of five N.C. nursing homes meets the staffing threshold recommended by a major federal study. Moreover, the state doesn’t even require

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an ass senior

Retirement

living

Many leading U.S. senior housing providers have a big presence in North Carolina. These are some of the major players.

■ Brookdale Senior Living is a Nashville, Tenn.-based public company with more than 60 N.C. locations. Its revenue from residents was $2.5 billion in 2021.

■ Newtown, Mass.-based AlerisLife owns or manages 21 seniorliving communities in the state that have about 1,900 units. N.C. revenue topped $78 million in 2021. Formerly called Five Star Senior Living, the publicly traded company has lost money consistently in recent years.

■ Winter Park, Fla.-based Holiday Retirement has about a dozen independent living communities offering senior apartments in Wilmington, the Triad, the Triangle and Charlotte.

■ Wilmington-based Liberty Senior Living operates nine retirement communities and a couple of dozen nursing centers across the state. It’s owned by the McNeill family.

■ Atlanta-based homebuilder PulteGroup owns Del Webb, which runs five active adult communities in the Charlotte, Raleigh and Wilmington areas.

minimum staffing ratios for nursing homes, which typically scramble to retain workers who can often make more money at warehouse or restaurant jobs. The series cited examples of horrible care for residents because so few staffers were on the job.

“The COVID pandemic has made [staffing challenges] many multiples worse, but the issue of finding service-sector employees was growing, and now things are as frustrating and difficult as we have ever seen,” says David Ammons, whose Raleigh-based Retirement Living Associates owns senior communities in the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida. “We’re currently hiring in almost all departments at all of our communities in North Carolina and Florida. We have openings such that a call out or two can really create a crisis.”

It’s a problem likely to linger for years as demand for senior housing expands, says Tom Akins, CEO of LeadingAge. “The first baby boomer turns 75 this year, and nearly 11,000 are turning 65 each day. The average age of entry to a CCRC in this state is around 82, meaning the staffing challenges we face today won’t even peak for another seven years,” he says.

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■ McLean, Va.-based Sunrise Senior Living operates eight communities with about 650 residents in Cary, Charlotte, Greensboro, Raleigh and Winston-Salem.

■ Kinston-based Principle Long Term Care owns nursing homes in more than a dozen cities including Wilkesboro, Robbinsville and Greensboro.

■ Atlanta-based SavaSenior Care has 21 rehabilitation and nursing home facilities in North Carolina.

Not-for-profit operators also play a big role in N.C. senior living.

■ Salisbury-based Lutheran Services Carolinas has nine nursing and senior-living communities from Arden to Wilmington. It had 1,368 units as of Dec. 31, 2020.

■ Colfax-based Presbyterian Homes has three continuing-care communities in Cary, Colfax and Laurinburg with 1,028 units.

■ Durham’s United Methodist Retirement Homes operates three communities in Durham, Greenville and Lumberton with 975 units.

■ Newton-based United Church Homes and Services has continuing-care communities in Newton and Thomasville, plus other affordable-housing projects in the state.

■ Givens Communities, which is affiliated with the United Methodist Church, has four locations in the Asheville area with 900 units.

Then there’s the state’s strategy to control the market for health care-related facilities. The intent is to promote efficiency and avoid excess capacity that drives up costs and causes financial tumult that hurts consumers. Certificate of Need regulation, or CON, is a topic that has set off sparks since state lawmakers enacted regulations in the 1970s.

A 2015 report from George Mason University’s Mercatus Center rated North Carolina’s CON program as the fourth most restrictive in the U.S. It concluded that when state governments restrict competition, health care costs accelerate for some while enabling existing medical providers to use their profits to boost care for the poor.

“We could build a lot of assisted-living facilities if they’d just let them have the beds,” says Segmiller, referring to state regulations around licensing special care units. “It turns off a lot of people I know. I have developer friends that want to come to North Carolina and see the market, but they can’t get beds, so they won’t come. So, who’s getting hurt? The people that live here.”

David Ammons, whose company employs more than 700 people, thinks the government’s control is excessive.

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“In my opinion, where an assisted living or skilled nursing facility will be privately funded and built, and the clients will be private pay, the CON process serves little to no purpose.”

Not everyone shares that view. North Carolina is protecting customers by limiting skilled-nursing home growth because more seniors are being served at ▲ David Ammons owns Raleigh’s Retirement Living Associates. home or in assisted-living facilities, says Perry Aycock of Longevity Markets, a Chapel Hill consultancy. “Overall trends show lower nursing home utilization, despite the demographic growth for the ages that have historically needed those services.”

Challenges to CON regulations are a perennial topic at the N.C. General Assembly, but House Speaker Tim Moore and other top lawmakers say major changes are unlikely in this year’s session.

While nursing homes and assisted living facilities are regulated by the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services, continuing-care retirement communities are scrutinized by the state Insurance Department. Each year, they have to provide a financial disclosure statement, including whether their reserves are in compliance.

“We have been fortunate in North Carolina that the regulatory environment for CCRCs has really been the model for states around the country,” LeadingAge’s Akins says.

“Because of our reporting requirements and our operating reserves, North Carolina has a set of very financially secure CCRCs, safeguarding consumer interests.”

PHOTOS COURTESY OF RETIREMENT LIVING ASSOCIATES, BROOKDALE

Creative business models Demand is growing for more creative approaches to pay for senior housing. It is too expensive for many in North Carolina, where the 65-plus crowd has a median annual household income of less than $42,000. Depending on the size and type of living unit, CCRC entrance fees generally range from $68,000 to $370,000, though more elaborate locations charge $1 million or more. Monthly fees typically fall between $2,000 and $4,000 but can top $8,000, according to the Department of Insurance.

In-home care is also pricey; the median cost of home health aide and homemaker services in North Carolina last year was $4,385 per month, according to insurer Genworth Financial.

Many seniors prefer to own their retirement units, says Ammons, who is developing the Legacy at Mills River CCRC near Asheville as 100% member-owned. The development was conceived more than 15 years ago but was slowed by the 2008-09 recession. Now it is slated to open in 2024 with 210 units in its first phase, with members investing from $400,000 to more than $1 million. They will retain the tax benefits of

homeownership, according to the development’s website.

Another emerging segment is at-home services, which allow people to plan ahead for finding and managing care when it’s needed. These programs can be cheaper than traditional long-term care insurance. Moreover, about 77% of adults who are 55 or older say they want to stay in their homes long-term, according to AARP research.

Navigation at Home, for example, was launched in 2014 by the Salemtowne Life Plan Community in Winston-Salem.

It is billed as combining “long-term care insurance with geriatric care management.” Program director Liz Brescka Hipsher says membership increased 25% last year to more than 100 people in the Triad.

“Most of our new members are people that we had been talking to for several years but previously told us they weren’t ready yet to make a decision,” Hipsher adds. “With the increase in long-term care insurance premiums, Naviga-

▲ Brookdale Senior Living has more than 60 locations across the state.

tion at Home is an alternative to paying for future care.”

Aycock of Longevity Markets says the data from similar programs indicates that more than 95% of program members never enter long-term care facilities. This is playing out for Navigation at Home: Only 2% of its membership receives regular long-term care in their home, according to Hipsher.

“Most of our utilization has been for short-term care in the home after events such as hip surgery, knee replacement or injury due to a fall.”

Just as quickly as they burst into this world, baby boomers will be the largest generation to fade out of it — but not without a fight. Experts have warned of a long-term care crisis by 2050, when 27 million Americans are expected to need such services, up from 13 million in 2000.

“Community and program development take time, and there will be a supply issue that extends beyond the workforce and construction materials challenges of the past two years,” Aycock says. “Every form of age-targeted housing and services will enjoy these challenges in the coming decades and those opportunities will create new models and new market leaders.” ■

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COMMUNITY CLOSE-UP

WESTERN N.C.

Though our roots are firmly planted in the mountains of Western North Carolina, UNC Asheville’s impact reaches far and wide. Our commitment to high-quality, mentored arts and sciences education prepares students for lives of significant leadership and service. UNC Asheville students conduct relevant, urgently needed research alongside our nationally respected faculty like Chemistry Professors Drs. Amanda Wolfe and Ryan Steed who recently received a National Institutes of Health (NIH) Academic Research Enhancement Award of over $380,000 to continue their research to develop new and more effective antibiotics to fight drug-resistant strains of bacteria. This type of applied, vitally important research happens in every academic discipline on UNC Asheville’s campus and marks a strong foundation for students to enter the workforce and thoughtforce.

UNC Asheville also creates high-impact, experiential learning opportunities for all students inside and outside the classroom. Our University serves as an incubator of ideas, where students consider key issues facing our world and think critically and creatively about ways to address them.

We create an environment where ideas are shared, discussed and put into action by offering programming like the upcoming Asheville Idea Fest (AIF) taking place June 14-18, 2022. The inaugural experience will take place on the campus of UNC Asheville and at key sites in the area, including the Biltmore Estate and Grove Park Inn. Asheville Ideas Fest will include lectures led by global thought leaders who will convene in Asheville to focus on the most consequential issues of our time, including Fareed Zakaria, host of Fareed Zakaria GPS for CNN Worldwide and bestselling author; Dr. Kizzmekia Corbett, research fellow and scientific lead for the Coronavirus Vaccines & Immunopathogenesis Team at the National Institutes of Health; and Jon Meacham, presidential historian and Pulitzer Prize-winning author, just to name a few.

At the intersection of what’s known and what’s possible, UNC Asheville prepares students broadly and deeply across the breadth of academic study, practices and skills necessary for productive 21st century citizens to serve in a free and democratic society—in service to North Carolina, the nation and the world.

Regards,

Nancy J. Cable Chancellor, UNC Asheville

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SPONSORED SECTION

4/21/22 11:36 PM

INVESTING IN THE WEST North Carolina’s mountain counties have always been popular with tourists.

Infrastructure improvements, community development and better career opportunities are making them appealing to more full-time residents and businesses.

Western North Carolina’s picturesque mountain vistas and abundant outdoor and cultural attractions bring plenty of visitors.

They didn’t shy away during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, when most of the travel and tourism industry ground to a halt because of stay-at-home orders.

Clay, Polk, and Yancey counties, for example, saw 14%, 9% and 16% increases in 2020 visitor spending from the year prior, respectively, according to N.C. Department of Commerce. And visitor spending in Buncombe County, which is home to the region’s largest city, Asheville, held steady. Industry experts say the region’s open spaces, which allowed socially distanced recreation, pushed

the performance.

But the state’s westernmost counties and Qualla Boundary — Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians’ reservation — are proving attractive in other ways. Nestled among the Blue Ridge range of the Appalachian Mountains, they’re home to more and more year-round residents, higher education, manufacturing and health care jobs, and entrepreneurs. “We don’t have to vacation here,” says Brittany Brady, president and CEO of Henderson County Partnership for Economic Development. “We work here. There are amenities that people are paying for hotels to come here and see.

And you see a positive migration.

They find they can actually live here.

To keep Henderson County first, we want to make sure we have a healthy tax base in economic development. We’re creating jobs that may not be a quantity number but a quality number.”

Asheville-based Biltmore Farms, founded in 1897 by George Vanderbilt, has an expansive portfolio of housing communities; business, retail and mixed-use properties; and hotels. It works to create sustainable communities through developing education, health care, arts and culture, and environmental and quality of life. “There are a lot of special places in the country that are urban, and there are a lot of mountain areas, but having urbanity in the mountains is really unique,” says

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American aerospace manufacturer Pratt & Whitney is building a factory in Asheville, creating 800 jobs.

Biltmore Farms Vice President of Strategic Development Ben Teague.

“It balances the sophistication of the cities and the serenity of nature.

There’s a lot to be said for having nature and innovation together, and that’s what I think western North Carolina is.”

ADDING INDUSTRIES Teague was among 60 people selected for the seventh-annual class of Presidential Leadership Scholars.

The career professionals attend monthly leadership sessions and meet with former presidents. “The caliber of people from all across the country is incredible,” Teague said in March. “It’s a life-changing experience. Like last week, I was with Bill Clinton, and in a couple weeks we’ll be with George W. Bush. It’s not political. It’s about leadership and good people who agree on a lot of things and how we

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craft that for the future.”

Through PLS sessions, participants gain knowledge, which they apply toward visions for their communities. “I think innovation and nature are symbiotic,” Teague says. “And that’s what the economic development has been, companies looking for talent and people looking for careers in a place they’re attracted to. And in western North Carolina, it’s our job to help them see how they can be professionally successful and personally successful.”

Henderson County Partnership’s 2020 target market analysis identified businesses that would grow best in the region’s economic climate.

“We went through … and found areas we could thrive in are health care, biotech companies, food and beverage — we’re the No. 1 apple producer in the state — and machinery, which supports the manufacturing in the region,” Brady says. “Also, professional services

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that support the manufacturing side, research and development, and the outdoors industry.”

Though regional tourism grew through the pandemic, COVID19 reshaped lives and outlooks.

“One thing we learned during the pandemic is we don’t want to be over reliant on one particular sector, so I think diversification in growth and looking for opportunities to capitalize on new industries is something we’re looking at and our partners are looking at,” says Scottie Parks, impact officer at Dogwood Health Trust, a private foundation improving the health and well-being of the region’s residents and communities.

“One is the outdoor industry. In 2020, so many people had nothing to do except get outside, and that’s a benefit for western North Carolina.

We had people coming from all over, and, working with local partners, we saw growth in manufacturing for the outdoor industry and entrepreneurship. We know that having a good-paying job is really the key to being a healthy individual and being able to afford to live in a safe environment and have affordable health care. When people have jobs and a good income, it’s helping the economy, and that’s helping all of western North Carolina.”

Aircraft-parts manufacturer Pratt & Whitney, for example, is building a 1 million-square-foot factory in Asheville, investing $650 million and creating 800 jobs. As Buncombe County’s largest economic development project, it’s expected to begin producing turbine airfoils this year. In a show of its commitment to economic development, Biltmore Farms sold 100 acres to Pratt & Whitney for $1. “Given the number of high-paying jobs and capital investment, we believe this project will benefit the families of western North Carolina for generations to come,” says Biltmore Farms President and CEO John “Jack” Cecil.

PHOTO CREDIT: PRATTWHINEY.COM

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BUILDING INFRASTRUCTURE Dogwood Health Trust was formed in 2019 when HCA Healthcare purchased Asheville-based Mission Health for $1.5 billion. “Dogwood is still relatively new, but our region has a rich tradition of individuals and organizations who are courageous, creative and persistent when it comes to helping their neighbors and communities enjoy healthy, fulfilled lives,” says CEO Susan Mims. “Our work focuses on supporting those organizations that align with our strategic priorities by providing grants or impact investments, making connections and helping them leverage other sources of funding, so they can become even more strategic, innovative and effective.”

Dogwood distributes about $100 million in grants annually, according to its website. It provided $3.7 million in Immediate Opportunities and Needs — ION — grants to 259 western North Carolina organizations in 2020, for example. They help meet myriad needs, including housing, child care, transportation and health care. Infrastructure is addressed,

too. “What we’re doing is funding some planning work for broadband [internet] adoption,” Parks says.

“We know it’s going to be critically important for our counties, and we know they need a solid plan. So, we’ve partnered with the Institute for Emerging Issues out of N.C. State to fund the planning grants for all 18 counties and the Qualla Boundary.”

He says each eventually will receive a $75,000 grant to implement the plan. A recent Appalachian Regional Commission study found 22% of homes in western North Carolina lack broadband access, a deficiency highlighted by remote learning and work during the pandemic.

Western North Carolina is ripe with opportunities, says Sarah Thompson, Dogwood’s vice president of impact — economic opportunity. But as is the case in many parts of Appalachia, they need help harvesting them.

“Their needs have been a lot about infrastructure, whether it’s highways or water and sewer or, these days, high-speed internet,” she says. “It’s about the infrastructure needs to have a thriving economy. There are beautiful small towns, where

people enjoy living, but the economy doesn’t exist. So, we’re focused largely on filling needs that will remove barriers.”

Teague sees other regional needs. “Biltmore Farms wants people to be able to make the life that they want and are willing to work for,” he says. “We need housing that they can see themselves in when they begin their career, for when they’re at the top of their game and at the end of their career. And we need to be watchful of our childcare needs, because if someone has a great job and can’t find childcare, it doesn’t matter. Early childhood education is so imperative, and Dogwood Health Trust is helping address this for western North Carolina.”

Dogwood commissioned Bowen National Research to quantify the region’s housing needs and supply in 2020. The six-month study examined population trends, income expectations, and supply and affordability for home ownership and rentals. It detailed the hourly wage needed to afford a twobedroom rental unit in each county.

That amount ranged from $12.90 in Graham, McDowell, Mitchell,

The Blue Ridge Parkway runs through Haywood County, which is comprised of Maggie Valley, Waynesville, Lake Junaluska, Canton and Clyde.

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Rutherford, Swain, and Yancey counties to $24.13 in Buncombe, Henderson, and Madison counties.

According to Asheville-based sustainable economy advocate Just Economics, the 2022 living wage — the minimum needed to meet basic needs — was $17.70 per hour in Buncombe County. It’s $13 in rural regions.

Bowen’s study identified a housing shortage in western North Carolina.

“While some of the need is for market-rate homes, much of our housing shortage falls in the areas of transitional, supportive or affordable housing,” says Sarah Grymes, Dogwood’s vice president of impact — housing. “Dogwood Health Trust is working with our nonprofit housing partners as well as counties and municipalities in our footprint to address these needs. Forming partnerships and leveraging other sources of revenue are going to be key to creating more safe and stable housing.”

Gateway Wellness Foundation helps local governments and nonprofits in Burke, McDowell, Polk and Rutherford counties address community needs. With Dogwood’s backing, it’s building 31 affordable

single-family homes in a Rutherfordton development that also will have 60 multifamily units and an Early Head Start location, which will support families and young children.

Gateway will build 26 affordable single-family homes in Marion later this year.

CREATING CAREERS Teague said jobs are important.

But residents need careers. “There has to be that ability for someone to get on the career ladder,” he says.

“And if the rungs are close enough, they can climb. But when you get on the career ladder and have to leave because you can’t get to the next rung, something’s broken. Pratt & Whitney is an ideal career-ladder employer. The manufacturer will take you out of high school and pay for the skills training all the way up to where you have a six-figure [salary] job.

When you can easily see the next rung and make it there, and have that pathway, that’s called economic hope. The average wage [for a machine operator] is $70,000-plus a year. Not only do you have a defined career ladder, but they pay you to move up. Those types of employers

are important for our future.”

Gateway President Neil Gurney says his foundation’s housing initiative offers more than roofs over heads. “[It] not only increases the affordable housing stock and the number of low-income, first-time homeowners, but it also increases the number of trained, certified carpenters and project managers to build the affordable homes and bolsters the local economy by sourcing its modular homes from Kituwah Builders, owned and operated by the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians,” he says.

McDowell Technical Community College’s Construction Trade Skills Academy, which is supported by Dogwood and Gateway, prepares students for general construction, construction project management and modular housing installation.

“This very technical aspect of the curriculum is coupled with additional courses on employability skills, communication and interpersonal skills,” Gurney says. “The student is being taught not only how to do the job but how to get the job and how to keep the job.”

Western Carolina University in Cullowhee held its Career Fair

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WESTERN N.C. PLUS+ in March. It attracted 150 employers, nonprofits and graduate school representatives. “The [Center for Career and Professional Development] works hard to ensure that each student can pursue their individual career goals in the state of North Carolina and, in particular, western North Carolina,” says Rich Price, WCU’s executive director of economic development and regional partnerships. “We introduce students to the surrounding community through employer panels, information sessions, career fairs, mock interview or resume review sessions, and classroom presentations.”

Price says WCU aligns its degree programs with high-growth and highdemand fields that are imperative to the region’s economic success.

“My role is to connect WCU to economic development related work and initiatives across western North Carolina,” he says. “Our goal is to make certain that WCU has a seat at the table, whether as an advocate or active participant, in the economic well-being of our region, which is germane to our mission as a regional comprehensive university. We work with economic development practitioners and organizations as a resource in their efforts to attract new business, retain and expand existing business, and to support and grow entrepreneurial endeavors.”

With workforce development initiatives at WCU, UNC Asheville, Appalachian State University in Boone and other higher-education institutions across the region, residents can prepare for wellpaying employment that’s close to home. “Our goal is to ensure that students see a meaningful path to working and living in the region, and they are connected to employer partners throughout their educational experience at Western Carolina University,” says Theresa Cruz Paul, director of WCU’s Center for Career and Professional Development.

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Commerce has been helping college students segue to careers since 2018, when it partnered with WCU, Warren Wilson College, Western North Carolina Human Resources Association, UNC Asheville and others to create NEXT AVL. It’s a mentorship program that pairs college junior and seniors with local professionals for nine months.

“Many UNC Asheville students are looking for something a little less traditional, and Asheville is a great place for that,” says Lisa Mann, director of UNC Asheville’s Career Center. “We love to connect students with real professionals who are doing the work they want to do, because networking is the most critical part of any type of job search.

Through mentorship programs, like NEXT AVL and our Alumni Mentor Week, we connect students with employers to broaden their horizons, consider options they may never have had before and open doors to opportunity. This is especially critical for students who want to stay in the Asheville metro area.”

UNC Asheville’s Career Center is available to students as early as their freshman year. Mann says the sooner they visit the better. “Our goal is to meet students where they are and help them figure out where they want to go next and how to get there,” she says. “That may be a creative endeavor, entrepreneurial or a more traditional 9-to-5 career.

We have more nonprofits and small businesses than any other part of the state. Getting connected with real people makes a difference.”

The State Employees’ Credit Union’s Public Fellows Internship Program began in 2015. It offers grants that help talent remain in the state’s rural communities. UNC Asheville’s most recent grants — $50,000 in 2020 and $100,000 in 2021 — helped 10 and 20 students, respectively, obtain internships in fields such as health care, forest protection and community services

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such as food banks and crisis centers. The university provides on-campus housing for graduate and undergraduate students interning during the summer.

The SECU Board of Directors expanded the internship program to 15 UNC campuses in January 2021, including Appalachian State and WCU. The $1.5 million in funding will cover costs for 20 interns from each school.

Appalachian State broke ground on its Innovation District in Boone in March. The Conservatory for Biodiversity Education and Research will develop economic opportunities across the region. “[It will] serve as a vital link between the campus and the regional community through education, research and outreach,” according to a university press release.

Dogwood’s Success Coach Partnership with Blue Ridge, Western Piedmont and Asheville-Buncombe Technical community colleges helps students stay on their chosen career track. “[It’s] essentially case workers and counselors for community college students that will ensure that these students have what they need to complete their credentials,” Parks says. “We had a meeting with community college presidents early in 2021 to hear from them about what challenges they face and what we can do. And Success Coach rose to the top of the conversation, so we felt like we could get those three [colleges] funded, and we hope to engage with some of the others.”

Workforce development is a moving target. “We’re watching workforce needs and requirements evolve right now,” Thompson says. “We are largely an Appalachia region that has historically been underinvested, so when we invest in workforce development, we do it with partners who are on the same page.” ■ — Kathy Blake is a writer from eastern North Carolina.

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GREENSHOOTS — Revitalizing rural N.C.

REMOTE CONTROL A mountain-area tech training program shows bright prospects.

BY DAN BARKIN

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pandemic, while their average household income is double the average of $37,000 to $45,000 in the three counties, Barricklow says.

►Dahntay Choate is the first NC Tech Paths graduate from the IT Support cohort with Per Scholas. Dahntay recently began a remote job with Centene Corporation.

DeLucia felt three things are essential for a remote tech workforce. First, training needed to be faster than the typical two-year community college curriculum. Second, it had to be focused to meet hiring specifications of specific companies. Third, companies would need to be OK with remote workers.

Per Scholas, a New York-based tech-training nonprofit, partnered with the foundation to provide boot camp-type courses. The rural N.C. project is its first venture outside a big city. It expects to train 2,500 people in North Carolina over the next three years, says CEO Plinio Ayala.

While remote work is the key, the NC Tech Paths program plans a building in North Wilkesboro for tech workers to collaborate in person.

“I believe the future of work is distributed,” says DeLucia. “But I also don’t believe that work-from-home five days a week is a longterm, sustainable proposition for companies or employees. Human beings need to collaborate.”

The first 16-week virtual boot camp for software engineering training ends in mid-May. The next wave focused on IT support will run through the summer. ■

PHOTOS COURTESY OF MONTY COMBS, NC TECH PATHS

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n North Carolina’s bigger cities, the talk among high-tech businesses is the shortage of talent. For rural counties, the talk is about the shortage of good jobs.

Trailblazers in the northwestern corner of North Carolina have come up with a way to address both problems, in what is one of the largest rural tech-training initiatives in the country. If successful, it could be replicated, raising income levels in other rural communities and helping N.C. companies fill 48,000 vacant tech jobs.

NC Tech Paths is a collaboration between Wilkes Community College and Wilkesboro-based Leonard G. Herring Family Foundation with a goal of providing technology skills for Alleghany, Ashe and Wilkes county residents to work remotely. The motto is, “Live. Train. Remain.”

The effort has strong financial support, a partnership with national training collaborator Per Scholas and the benefit of good timing.

People skilled to troubleshoot networks, handle cybersecurity or staff an IT help desk can work anywhere there is broadband. Pretty much every enterprise is a tech company that needs talent.

NC Tech Paths kicked off five years ago when Jeff Cox, president of Wilkes Community College, launched a strategic planning process aimed at helping more students complete their courses to earn degrees. The broader goal is to boost wealth in the region, where the median household income is 75% of the state average. Cox attracted support from The John M. Belk Endowment of Charlotte and the Herring Foundation, formed by the late Leonard Herring, a former Lowe’s Cos. CEO. Executing the plan has helped the college boost the percentage of students graduating within three years to 45%, from 25%. But it didn’t address how to provide jobs so graduates wouldn’t have to leave northwest North Carolina.

So Cox hired Zach Barricklow as vice president of strategy. Barricklow is a Michigan native whose wife, Lauren, is from Sparta. They met in the Peace Corps and were living in Alleghany County.

Barricklow told then-Herring Foundation CEO Craig DeLucia in 2019 that local people could be trained and stay in the area for goodpaying, remote telework jobs.

“I said, ‘Zach, you’re nuts,’” DeLucia recalls. “‘What’s going to happen in this world that’s going to lead companies to embrace remote work at scale?’” The answer, of course, came in March 2020.

DeLucia called Barricklow and said, “Fire up the oven, heat up the crow. I’m ready to eat it.’” DeLucia is now president of NC Tech Paths, while Barricklow is executive director while still working for the community college.

More than 93% of tech workers continued working during the C A R O L I N A

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