April 2024 Guilford College Magazine

GUILFORD COLLEGE

FINDING GUILFORD’S “WHY”

Friends,

AS I MOVED THROUGH MY FIRST TWO YEARS as President, I’ve been exploring — along with other stakeholders — questions about what matters most to our community and how we define who we are and what we are truly about.

Last fall, a task group of faculty and staff led by a specialist in marketing, innovation and social change, asked our community to share their thoughts about our identity and values to better understand what makes us unique and relevant and to identify our aspirations and hopes for the future. This process of introspection and engagement is pivotal as we seek to sustain the College in a world that needs much of what we have to offer.

We undertook the “Guilford Why” project to help re-energize our community with a shared sense of purpose and impact and to help better communicate Guilford's value to potential students and philanthropic supporters. Through a series of polls and in-person sessions with faculty, staff, students and other stakeholders, our task group gathered information that is being synthesized to shape a narrative that will enhance our communications, which is a priority of our strategic plan, Envisioning Guilford 2027

The findings, reported by our task group and summarized below, were consistent and positive across all stakeholder groups:

Unapologetically liberal arts: Guilford offers a rich tapestry of experiences. It is a place characterized by diversity, community, peace and the opportunity for new and enriching encounters. We want our students to become independent, critical and creative thinkers. We want them to become more aware, intentional and empowered. We want them to develop the tools to critically assess social formations and imaginaries and cultivate the capability and commitment to build

a better life and a more beautiful world. I encourage you to read this issue's cover story on our liberal arts commitment starting on page 12.

Deep values rooted in Quaker principles:

Guilford upholds a set of core values rooted in Quaker testimonies. The College encourages students to grow within a close-knit community where people care about each other. The community is dedicated to fostering diversity and equity in education, creating a welcoming and loving atmosphere. Students support each other, leaning on one another for success, and learn to be responsible and considerate.

A transformative learning environment:

The academic environment at Guilford is marked by several key factors. Professors are held in high regard for their dedication and expertise, while students benefit from a supportive and collaborative atmosphere. Personal relationships between students, faculty and staff are fostered, enabling individual attention and access to essential resources. Academic programs offer opportunities for growth and development, often in small classes conducive to learning. We want our students to leave with relationships and opportunities that will help expand their selves and professional careers. We want them to find their passion here, and be transformed by a Guilford education. In short, we want our students to become the best versions of themselves, and to use their talents and gifts to make the world a better place.

Community is at the heart of the Guilford experience: Guilford is known for its caring people who exhibit kindness and create an environment of inclusion and belonging. The sense of community is further enhanced by the diversity of its members, including those who enjoy being around individuals from various backgrounds. The college promotes kinship, forging close

connections between students and faculty. Additionally, the staff's genuine investment in the wellbeing of students contributes to the creation of a safe and accepting space where meaningful interactions thrive.

A campus environment that embodies wellbeing:

Guilford's open and inclusive campus engenders peace, wellbeing, and connection. It is a place that nurtures mind, body and spirit. The physical environment of the campus is serene and beautiful, with picturesque woods and a natural setting that provides a sense of tranquility.

Investing in people — financially and emotionally:

Guilford desires to provide for a diverse student body, including those who would not otherwise be able to access a quality education. It offers resources and support systems that include a community of advisors who provide personal assistance. It nurtures leadership through scholars programs and campus and community engagement opportunities. Clubs, sports and other activities contribute to a vibrant campus life, and the principle of mutual aid underscores the spirit of collaboration and caring within the community.

Our college is in a strong position to claim and enhance the attributes that make it exceptional. An alumnus who serves on our Board of Trustees has said, “Guilford changes your life and equips you with the skills to change the world.”

Through various channels, we will spread those words and others far and wide.

Warmly,

Kyle Farmbry, J.D., Ph.D. President

EDITOR

Robert Bell ’11

DESIGN

Chris Ferguson

PHOTOGRAPHY

Jay Capers

Michael Crouch ’10 & ’12

Lynn Hey

Woody Marshall

COMMUNICATIONS & MARKETING TEAM

Ty Buckner, Vice President of Communications & Marketing

Robert Bell ’11, Assistant Director of Communications & Marketing

Michael Crouch ’10 & ’12, Director of Brand & Marketing Operations

LaToya Marsh , Director of the Bryan Series

Aziz Peregrino-Brimah , Digital Content Manager

Lydia Saunders ’23, Presidential Fellow

FUNDRAISING TEAM

LaDaniel Gatling II, Vice President for Advancement & Alumni Relations

Stephanie Walton, Director of Annual Giving & Donor Relations

Elizabeth Freeze, Senior Director of Philanthropy

Rick Lancaster ’88, Director of Development & Strategic Engagement

Lauren Reinking , Director of Alumni Relations & Engagement

CONTACT US

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Guilford College

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Oh, the humanities

Higher education nationally is under a lot of pressure these days. Enrollment is down, skepticism on a degree’s worth is up. And an increasing number of lawmakers are trying to clamp down on academic freedoms, diversity and social justice movements.

No wonder many small liberal arts colleges are rethinking their academic missions and adding more vocational opportunities at the expense of humanities. Fortunately, Guilford is bucking that trend. In fact, as more liberal arts colleges reconsider their roles in an increasingly global and ever-changing, tech-driven economy, Guilford is doubling down on its liberal arts heritage.

This issue of Guilford College Magazine celebrates our commitment to liberal learning. We take a look at Guilford professors past (the late Ted Benfey) and present (Writing Director Parag Budhecha) and the impact they had and are continuing to have on their students. We also examine why the College is unwavering in its commitment of providing our students with a degree grounded in liberal arts.

Guilford’s mission goes beyond equipping young (and notso-young) adults with specific tools they need for a career they’re passionate about. The College also nourishes and encourages a student’s critical and broad thinking to better their corner of the world. That aha-moment of illumination that takes place when we discover a connection between something we just leanred and what we've known all along? That is liberal learning. That is Guilford.

— Robert Bell ’11 Editor

IN THIS ISSUE

4 A special bond

Chemistry professors Rob Whitnell and Anne Glenn make a generous gift to the college.

8 New leader for new times

The new chair of the board of trustees is a former Guilford student. Get to know Jean Bordewich.

12 Celebrating liberal arts heritage

While some colleges are rethinking their liberal arts mission, Guilford is celebrating its roots.

16 A beautiful mind

The late Ted Benfey helped meld Guilford's liberal arts and sciences.

18 A March to remember

Guilford’s men’s basketball team went on a remarkable postseason run — and Quaker Nation went along for the ride.

22 Into the woods

Cayce Burch ’16 finds peace in Guilford Woods. He hopes his photos help others find that comfort, too.

24 A familiar ring

Terry Bralley ’76 thought he'd never see his class ring again. Thirty-five years later, his phone rang.

26 Gentlemen, start your computers

Charles Wimbley ’26 is one of the nation’s top e-racers without ever leaving his dorm room.

28 By the book

Andrew Biggadike ’02 doesn't make the rules of golf, he just enforces them.

34 A lifetime of love

Gene ’49 and Eldora Terrell ’49 spent a lifetime together. Their love story started at Guilford.

April 2024

On the Cover

Guilford students like Jahmarley Vivens ’26 are embracing their liberal arts learning.

A GIFT OF LOVE

Chemistry professors Rob Whitnell and Anne Glenn donate $1 million to the College.

ANNE GLENN AND ROB WHITNELL

love Guilford College. It’s where the two started teaching 30 years ago, where they began dating shortly after Rob arrived at Guilford and eventually married under a canopy of oaks and maples on the quad, surrounded by friends and family, faculty colleagues and students, on a summer morning in 1996.

In January, Anne and Rob announced another chapter to their love story. The Chemistry professors will expand educational opportunities for students and faculty through a gift of $1 million to the College over the next 10 years.

The gift, the largest received by the College from current or retired faculty, will go toward supporting three academic departments that are dear to Rob and Anne — Chemistry, Computing Technology and Information Systems, and Health Sciences — as well as Guilford’s Study Abroad program and academic programs in general.

Anne and Rob came to Guilford as Chemistry professors in 1992 and 1994, respectively. Their roles quickly expanded. Rob helped start the College’s computing majors. He also led institutional research and information technology and services at one point Anne helped develop the College’s Health Sciences major.

As the couple started thinking about retirement, they wanted to support a College that has been a large part of their personal and professional lives.

“(Chemistry and Computer Science) are programs that mean a lot to us and we want to make sure they have the

support to flourish and grow stronger in the years to come,” says Anne. “The more we talked about it, the more it just made sense to us to give.”

Starting this year, their gift will support equipment replacement and upgrades, scholarships, student and faculty travel to professional meetings, and accreditations and certifications for students, faculty and staff.

There will also be scholarships that will lower the barriers for students with financial need to participate in study abroad and study away programs.

Rob says the gift came easily to the couple, but explaining why is a little

harder. He says they’ve both enjoyed working closely with so many students over the years and the relationships they’ve built. “We want that experience for future Guilford students to be just as special while we’re here and after we’ve left,” he says.

“We are so intimately connected to this place,” says Rob, whose third-floor office in the Frank Family Science Center is next to Anne’s. “We’ve worked with so many wonderful faculty, so many great students. We’re grateful for the opportunities we’ve had at Guilford, and we’re happy to support those who will follow us.” •

CHEMISTRY PROFESSORS

ANNE GLENN AND ROB WHITNELL

Making a Difference

Black Alumni of Guilford and longtime friends of the College are honored for their service and philanthropy.

A GUILFORD ALUMNI GROUP and two other longtime friends of the College were recently recognized by the Association of Fundraising Professionals for their generosity.

Charlie Routh and his late wife Mary Kirkman Routh ’45 received the Lifetime Achievement Award by the association’s North Carolina Triad Chapter. Toiya Hancock ’93 and the Black Alumni of Guilford College received the IDEA (Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Access) Award for Greensboro.

Charlie and Mary have been longtime supporters of Guilford. In 2019, the couple made a deferred gift to the College establishing a tenure-track professorship dedicated to Quaker studies. The couple received Guilford’s distinguished Algernon Sydney Sullivan Community Member Award in 2022 for a lifetime of community support.

It’s the second time in five years that people associated with Guilford were recognized with the Triad Chapter’s highest award. In 2019, John Googe ’50 was the recipient.

Toiya is one of the founding members of the Black Alumni of Guilford College (BAGC) and its president. She is proud that many of the alumni who helped create the BAGC are still part of the group today. “Now we want to get more Black Guilford graduates involved,” she says.

The group, which has given out more than $30,000 in scholarships since its inception, plans to reach out to more

Black alumni in 2024 , the 60th anniversary of the graduation of Washington Rakama '64 from Guilford. A Kenyan, in the fall of 1962 he was among the first three Black students to enroll at the College. To celebrate, the BAGC will host events throughout 2024 to honor Washington and other Black graduates from the 1960s. “We’ve come a long way,” Toiya says. “But I believe we are going to go even further in welcoming and recognizing all of our Black alumni friends.” •

TOIYA HANCOCK ’ 93

BE BOLD, BE YOU

Symposium asks students to walk in their power

CLAIRE HUA IS A SENIOR at Greensboro Day School who has driven by Guilford and admired its trees and red-bricked buildings through the years, but never showed interest in attending the College.

All that changed on Feb. 23 when the senior spent an entire day on campus attending the first Gertrude Judd Upperman ’69 Symposium.

Claire and 63 other high school students from Guilford County spent a day at the College exploring Black cultural identity, expression, experiences, activism, challenges and resilience.

It also served as a way for students like Claire to learn more about a liberal arts college in their own backyard. She wants to attend college and major in Psychology. “I really enjoyed the breakout

sessions and getting to know more about the school. I hadn’t given (Guilford) much thought, but it’s definitely on my radar now.”

That was one of the many motivations behind hosting the symposium, named in memory of one of Guilford’s most active alumni leaders over the years.

Ayesha Swinton, the College’s Director of Transformation and Inclusion, says the symposium was another way of supporting students of color in Greensboro while showing off the College.

“Guilford’s a place where people of color can see themselves and that’s a big deal, says Ayesha. “It’s important to help people feel like they can connect and they can be their authentic selves in any situation. Guilford does a really good job with that everyday but even more so today.” •

Program, manual are recognized

A Guilford initiative to build students’ oral and visual communication skills has been recognized by a regional organization that oversees accreditation of the College.

The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges highlighted SpeakUP:UnifyingPresentationsforan Inclusive,ConnectedWorld — which is the Quality Enhancement Plan in Guilford's latest affirmation for accreditation — as a model program that is helping students enhance their communication skills.

Guilford faculty, staff, and students developed the plan over the course of a year. Lincoln Financial Professor of History Damon Akins helped coordinate the project with other faculty members. He says faculty wanted to emphasize storytelling in how students create compelling presentations. “A core component of any good presentation is the story,” says Damon. “Is the story good? Is it powerful? If the answer is yes, then how do we tell it?”

Part of the project included creating a guide to storytelling and presentation. TheSoWhat is a 192-page manual for first-year students to help them find their story, identify their audience and structure the story. The manual also helps students with design and visual effects to supplement a slideshow or PowerPoint.

Damon says the style guide can be used by students across the campus regardless of the class. “The guide is really about creating a common language for how we talk about and do presentations,” says Damon. “There are so many different disciplines (at Guilford) where presentations are different,” says Damon. “What constitutes a presentation in a Physics class is different than an English class, but The So What addresses that.”

PHOTOS BY MICHAEL CROUCH '10 & '12

JAMES SHIELDS '00, FORMER DIRECTOR OF THE BONNER CENTER FOR COMMUNITY SERVICE AND LEARNING AT GUILFORD, SPOKE WITH STUDENTS AT THE SYMPOSIUM.

CLAIRE HUA

Wooden named Enrollment VP

Guilford’s new Vice President for Enrollment Management is a familiar face around campus.

Gus Davis, a Guilford leader, is honored

EXAMPLES OF GUS DAVIS’ ’ 72 IMPACT ON THE COLLEGE HE LOVED are everywhere. He was a member of the Board of Trustees. He co-chaired the trustees’ Constituent Engagement and Reputation Council and helped fashion solutions to recent fiscal and other institutional challenges. Gus wore so many different hats for the College he loved it could be easy to forget one of those hats was a baseball cap.

On Feb. 23, baseball players young and old gathered near Edgar H. McBane ’14 Field to dedicate the Quakers’ home baseball dugout in his name. Gus died in 2022.

Rick Goings ’ 70 , a classmate and later business mentor to Gus, made a generous gift of $25,000 to name the space for Gus. “It’s such an honor,” says Ann Davis, Gus’ wife. “Gus loved everything about Guilford and that included baseball and his teammates.”

Kyle Wooden ’11 received the new title late last year after spending 11 years as a member of the Admission team. In each of the past two years coming out of the COVID pandemic period, Admission has met or exceeded goals by enrolling 400-plus first-year, transfer, and readmitted traditional-aged students.

Kyle was a History major at Guilford. He played four years for the Quakers baseball team and was inducted into the 2023 class of the Guilford Athletics Hall of Fame.

GUS DAVIS ’ WIFE, ANN, AND HIS TEAMMATES AND CLASSMATES (LEFT TO RIGHT) RON SCHMIDT ’ 75, ROBERT FULTON ’ 74, RICK FULTON, LARRY JACKSON ’ 78, ANN DAVIS, MIKE DIMOFF ’ 74, JAY TERRELL ’ 72, JOHN PARKER ’ 72, AND GEOFF CLARK ’ 72 ATTENDED THE DEDICATION.

NEW ERA, NEW LEADER

The College’s new Board of Trustees chair will help steward Guilford into a period of growth and change. Jean Bordewich can’t wait.

Safe to say Jean Parvin Bordewich’s career has run a wide spectrum. She’s a playwright, consultant and former program officer at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation who also spent more than 20 years as a Congressional staff member and served as staff director of the Senate Rules Committee. Her latest move seems less a job and more a calling. Jean, who graduated from Brown, became chair of Guilford’s Board of Trustees in February, barely 16 months after joining the board. Jean recently sat down with Guilford College Magazine to talk about the board, Guilford’s future as a liberal arts college and how her experiences as a student at Guilford helped shape her life.

A year after joining the board you were named its chair. That’s a quick leap. What made you want to lead?

I want to help secure Guilford’s future as a Quaker-grounded liberal arts college. That’s why I became involved in fundraising for the Guilford Forward Fund several years ago and then accepted a position as a trustee. Last fall the nominating committee asked me to serve as the new chair. It’s a volunteer position that is very time-consuming and many trustees can’t make that commitment, but I can.

Take us behind the curtain. What’s the role of the board, and what will your new role look like?

The trustees are stewards of Guilford’s purpose for the long term, and that includes providing fiduciary oversight to carry out that mission. The board is responsible for governance of

the College; the president and his administration are responsible for day-to-day management. My priorities for this year are to strengthen board operations, support [President] Kyle Farmbry and his team and increase the board’s engagement in fundraising. Ione Taylor ’76, a very experienced trustee who will soon retire from the board after 12 years, has done a superb job as chair, navigating the Board and the College through difficult times. I look forward to consulting with her.

“My priorities for this year are to strengthen board operations, support [President Farmbry] and his team and increase the board’s engagement in fundraising. ”

— Jean Bordewich

You come from a long line of family members who attended Guilford. Was it always assumed you would attend Guilford?

My family didn’t assume I would go to Guilford; it was my desire. I was always attracted to the North Carolina Quaker heritage of my mother’s family and wanted to go deeper into learning about Quaker beliefs and practices. Eventually, I became a practicing member of the Religious Society of Friends. I also had some Philadelphia and New Jersey Quakers among my

father’s ancestors. With more than 20 relatives who had attended Guilford, I felt it was the right place for me. I loved the physical beauty and the experience of a small residential campus where I forged lifelong friendships and felt I was part of a community.

Guilford has experienced much change since President Farmbry arrived in 2022, and even more is coming. Do you worry those changes could jeopardize the College’s liberal arts roots?

This board — as well as most alumni and faculty — are committed to Guilford remaining a small liberal arts college that fosters close relationships and community, and remains a place where students can spend four years discovering and preparing for their purpose in life. Of course, the ways in which the liberal arts adapt in order to reflect and shape change in society evolve over time. What endures is the commitment to the essential qualities of a liberal arts education and the influence it has on one’s life.

Who had an influence on you when you at Guilford?

Bruce Stewart ’61, who led the Richardson Fellows Program, made a huge difference in my life. Memorable faculty include Carroll Feagins, who taught by personal example and in the classroom about the deeper dimensions of Quaker faith and practice; Carter Delafield, whose composition class turned me into a writer; Anne Deagon,

a poet and classics scholar who had a remarkably idiosyncratic intellect; and Paul Zopf, whose wisdom and kindness make him a trusted friend even today.

You got your start in politics at Guilford with a Congressional internship in Washington. How did the College play a role in helping you find that spark? It was not something I planned. I was interested in journalism and mathematics and ancient Greek, not politics or government particularly. Several friends from Guilford were going to Washington, D.C., for summer internships and I wanted to join them but I didn’t know what to do there. I found out decades later that Mrs. Ann Buford, who was our “dorm mother,” had recommended me for an internship with Rep. Richardson Preyer. That internship was crucial to my getting a job in the U.S. Senate after I graduated, which turned into a career.

You’ve written several plays. What can you tell us about Now’s the Time? Now’s the Time is about the early years of Reconstruction and speaks to some of the challenges we have in our society and government today. The main character is Congressman Thaddeus Stevens, one of the most consequential members of Congress ever. Today he is either forgotten or misremembered from the grotesque and inaccurate caricature of him in the 1915 film, “Birth of a Nation,” which gave rise to the 20th century Ku Klux Klan.

My current commission is a play about the election of 1876, President Rutherford B. Hayes and the electoral college. It’s scheduled to be filmed and made available with an accompanying educational curriculum by the end of this year.

Both plays are part of the “Teaching the Constitution Through Theater”

program of the U.S. Capitol Historical Society and StoryWorks Theater which is accessible online at no cost.

There are not a lot of Congressional staff members who can also write plays. How did Guilford help you acquire the skills to do both jobs?

I wasn’t involved in theater at Guilford and I only started writing plays decades later. But at Guilford I learned that it’s okay to try new things even if you don’t always do them well or decide not to keep doing them. In terms of skills, Carter Delafield taught me that rewriting is essential to making any composition better. She was a hard grader, known for never giving As. But if a student was willing to rewrite an assignment, she would read it again and if it improved, raise the grade. Over and over. I was determined to get an A from her, and I did. •

PHOTO COURTESY OF JEAN BORDEWICH

JEAN BORDEWICH TOOK OVER AS CHAIR OF GUILFORD'S BOARD OF TRUSTEES IN FEBRUARY.

ALL THE WRITE STUFF

Parag Budhecha knows writing can be traumatic for some first-year students. She’s there to help them, one sentence at a time.

WITHIN PARAG BUDHECHA there resides a muse, albeit a small and reserved muse, who would love nothing more than to spark the next great American novel. You know, the kind of novel that propels Parag on book tours for weeks on end and has agents waiting outside her Archdale Hall office when she gets back. The kind of novel that’s optioned into a movie and has Hollywood calling to get her thoughts — Angela Bassett or Elizabeth Olsen? — for the lead.

Of course she’s wondered what it would be like to give voice to that character or find the single verb that enlivens the opening scene, sending readers on a page-flipping ride that ends with …

Stop right there. Don’t think this is the first time Guilford’s Writing Program Director has heard this question before. She does a little creative writing in her spare time, even wishes she could do more. “But that’s not what I really love,” she says. “What I really love is helping other people write better.”

And for 13 years Parag’s been helping Guilford students do just that. She came to the College in 2009 from Duke, where she served as Associate Director of the university’s writing program. Parag’s a visiting assistant professor in Guilford’s English Department and, since 2011 has led the College’s Writing Program. At their core, creative and academic writers require similar skills, says

Parag. Both need to research their topics and discover what new ideas can be brought to the subject. “Academic writing is more about, ‘Hey, I have something to say, I have a contribution to make to this conversation I’ve been reading or hearing about,’ ” says Parag. “I like thinking about the most effective way I can get my idea across and persuade other people that I have a good idea or, at least, an idea they should consider.”

“I like thinking about the most effective way I can get my idea across and persuade other people that I have a good idea or, at least, an idea they should consider.”

— Parag Budhecha

The ability to research, analyze and convey that information in clear, persuasive writing are good tools to possess, says Parag, not just over four years at a writing-intensive liberal arts college like Guilford, but in whatever work students land after college. The trick, she says, is getting students to appreciate the importance of the College’s composition and rhetoric classes that are a requirement for an overwhelming majority of Guilford students.

Parag says most first-year students

want to be anywhere but in her classroom researching claims and evidence, discovering rhetorical strategies, and learning to write for different audiences. She doesn’t take this personally.

Just as Parag asks her students to think about their audience before sitting down to write, she thinks about the audience in her classroom. “A lot of my students have had traumatic educational experiences with writing,” she says. “They’ve been told they don’t write the right way, or that they’re bad readers or writers. They feel like they’ve been punished for the kind of writing they do so they don’t want to be there. They don't see the benefit.”

Not initially at least. “Developing as a reader and writer is a slow burn,” says Parag. “I see some progress within a semester, but it’s not until a student’s junior or senior year when the lights maybe come on and everything comes together.”

Cole Flaherty ’25, an Education major, remembers walking into Parag’s ENG 102 classroom last spring not knowing what to expect. “Each class was something new and different,” Cole says. “Sometimes professors teach the same stuff from 20 years ago, but that’s not Parag. She has really good lesson plans that a lot of students can relate to.”

Parag was a sophomore at the University of Arizona when she realized she had “a gift,” as she calls it, of reading a book or an essay and putting her

research, thoughts and feelings to paper. Parag's professors saw that gift, too, and made her one of the university’s first writing tutors. “I absolutely loved helping other students craft their work and their words,” she says. “That’s when I realized I was good at offering this kind of help and maybe I could help, maybe even teach, others how to write.”

That love of writing grew from a love of reading. Even as a child, Parag was a precocious reader. Her sister, who is nearly seven years older, was constantly telling her to read the book she’d just put down. “I was probably reading things way before I should have been reading them but that’s how I got hooked,” says Parag. Parag says students today are reading

and writing even more than previous generations thanks to social media. “Think about it – they’re always reading Instagram posts, and they're always texting back and forth,” she says.

The challenge for Parag is to help students enhance those Instagram posts and texts. Earlier this spring she gave students a three-part assignment to do just that. Given the basic facts that a fictitious Joe Smith was found stabbed to death in a Greensboro parking garage, students were first asked to write a murder story. The story needed to include characters and their relevant background details as well as the investigation and subsequent court case. Students were then asked

OUR LIBERAL ARTS

to write reports from four different perspectives: a detective’s report, the coroner’s report, a family member’s eulogy, and a closing argument from the prosecutor.

It’s an assignment Parag uses with most of her rhetoric classes. “I thought it was a really creative way to get us thinking about writing and who our audience is,” says Cole. “So one paper you’re writing from the coroner’s perspective and maybe it’s a lot more scientific with medical terms and then you’re writing from a family member at the funeral and it’s a little more personal. It’s a creative way for using some of the (rhetorical) principles that come into reading and writing. Her class has really helped me in other classes.”

Parag says that writing clearly comes only after students first begin to think clearly. "Those are two skills that feed off each other," says Parag.

Cole understands and appreciates what Parag has instilled in him at Guilford. "When I sit down to write it's almost always the same," he says. "My thoughts are kind of scattered everywhere. It's the sitting down to write that helps me sort out my thoughts and connect them to the topic logically."

They may not have been written down, but Cole's words are music to Parag's ears. No matter who you are or what you want to do — a teacher, a politician, a lawyer, a businessperson — writing forces you to make choices and bring clarity and order to your ideas, she says.

“I want students to recognize what they're learning is going to do more than just help them in my class,” she says. “I want them to be ready to write or communicate not just for their next class or courses in their major but also when they get a job.” •

ENGLISH PROFESSOR PARAG BUDHECHA HELPS STUDENTS LIKE LIKE NADIA HOWELL ’26 BECOME BETTER WRITERS BY FIRST HELPING THEM BECOME CLEARER THINKERS.

PRESIDENT KYLE FARMBRY HANGS OUT WITH J WILSON ’ 26, DEON MCFARLAND ’ 24, HANNAH ROTEN ’ 26 AND JACOB MITCHELL ’ 25 ON THE QUAD.

LIFTING UP OUR LIBERAL ARTS

Across the Country, Small Colleges are Rethinking Their Commitment to the Liberal Arts. Not at Guilford, Where We're Celebrating Our Roots.

FOR YEARS, ECONOMISTS, LAWMAKERS and more than a few worried parents have questioned the value of a liberal arts education. In an economy increasingly defined by technology, the argument goes, small liberal arts colleges like Guilford need to follow the lead of larger universities and push skills-based learning more closely aligned to employment onto their students.

Critics of the liberal arts will have a hard time winning over Tinyah Ervin ’23. On a radiant morning last May, Tinyah and her classmates, billowing figures in black robes and maroon-tasseled mortarboards, floated across the quad on a carpet of whoops and shouts to accept their diplomas.

That Guilford diploma didn’t come without learning a thing or two about critical analysis, reflection, and communication. Tinyah’s convinced a liberal education, one as broad as it is deep at Guilford, is a prerequisite to whatever she wants personally and professionally in life.

When she started college at Guilford, Tinyah took the prerequisite first-year classes before branching out to Justice & Policy Studies classes on Understanding Oppressive Systems and Capital Punishment, an Art class on the History of Monuments, a Physical Education class in Tai Chi.

Those classes might seem counterintuitive — especially to parents cringing at tuition bills and Socratic seminars by the lake — but Tinyah made the connections early on. A double major

BY ROBERT BELL '11

in Biology and Psychology with a minor in Criminal Justice, she wants to be a doctor and the Justice & Policy classes, for example, will help her best advocate for herself and patients. She quickly learned that in the small classes Guilford is known for, she had to not only complete the work, but be ready to answer tough questions, appreciate multiple perspectives and explain her ideas.

Soon Tinyah will apply to medical schools. It’s a nail-biting experience for students like her, but if she’s nervous, she hides it well. Besides equipping her with the tools to thrive, a liberal arts education has instilled in her a quiet sense of confidence. “You can hide at a large university but not Guilford,” she says. “Guilford is going to give me an edge. Not just an edge when I apply to medical school, but after. That’s what a liberal arts education does. It hasn’t just prepared me for a career, it’s prepared me for the world.”

For President Kyle Farmbry, Tinyah's words — and those of other Guilfordians before her — are as timely as they are affirming. While many higher-education institutions are questioning — even paring — a liberal arts curriculum, Kyle says Guilford is “doubling down on our liberal arts roots.” He says, “a liberal arts education is critical — not just for the career you pursue but the life you live pursuing it."

Kyle has heard the adage, the one boasting a liberal arts education teaches students how to

PHOTO BY PERFECTA VISUALS

think. He says that axiom doesn’t do a liberal education justice. “A Guilford education, teaches our students not just how to think but how to communicate, written and verbally, and see issues differently, how to evaluate and solve problems,” says Kyle. “Those are skills that may not seem important right out of college, but as our students move into their careers [those skills] become more valuable and lead to advancement. Some students take years to master those skills. Guilford students are in possession of them when they graduate.”

That tracks with Mark Cubberley ’79, who had a diverse career before

retiring last year. There wasn’t a day on the job that Mark says he didn’t tap into his liberal arts education.

Guilford, he says, opened him to seeing, understanding and respecting other people’s thoughts and ideas. “Whether I was speaking to hundreds of doctors or pharmaceutical sales representatives or advancing local, state or national political initiatives, it was critical that I was well-rounded and informed,” he says.

The biggest value of a liberal arts education is the opportunity to develop a breadth of knowledge and depth of understanding from courses outside

one’s major and take that knowledge wherever you go. Jahmarley Vivens ’26 didn’t see that when he first walked on campus. He sees it now. Jahmarley is a Business major. He wants to sell real estate — maybe even own a few properties — back home in Miami. That Business degree will certainly help, but it didn’t take long for Jahmarley to realize the skills he’s developing at Guilford will give him an edge over Business majors from other schools constrained by a narrow curriculum. He's pursuing a minor in Sociology because it’s a field he believes will prepare him for many careers. He

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: TODD WOERNER ’ 78, TINYAH ERVIN ’ 23; MARK CUBBERLY ’ 79, AND JAHMARLEY VIVENS ’ 26.

PHOTOS BY ROBERT BELL ’ 11

“A Liberal arts education is critical—not just for the career or careers you pursue but the life you live pursuing them.”

— President Kyle Farmbry

rattles off some of the proficiencies he’s learning outside his Business classes: writing and speaking clearly; working cohesively in a group; thinking strategically and critically; problem solving; and collecting and analyzing data. He’s excited about how Sociology — a discipline he knew nothing about until Guilford — can help him in real estate.

“If I want to work in a place (as diverse as) Miami,” Jahmarley says, “doesn’t it make sense to understand the lives of everyone living there? Their social lives, their social changes? I would have never thought this way without coming to Guilford.”

That breadth of knowledge is a staple of liberal arts education, says Heather Hayton, Robert K. Marshall Professor of English and Director of the College’s Honors Program. “We’re not training a student to be excellent at one particular skill set that’s going to be irrelevant in five years. We’re training our students how to think, how to problem solve, how to approach problems from different disciplines and fields of study.”

At Guilford, it’s not uncommon for Biology and Chemistry students to sit next to Theatre Studies and Psychology majors in a History class. A liberal arts education at Guilford fosters in students the desire and capacity to learn, and master skills like reading critically, thinking broadly and communicating clearly while strengthening their analytical, investigative and intellectual abilities, says Jill Peterfeso, Eli Franklin Craven and Minnie Phipps Craven Associate Professor of Religious Studies.

Last summer, Jill and Tom Guthrie, Professor of Sociology and Anthropology, offered a retreat for faculty to discuss Guilford’s identity in an educational landscape where the liberal arts are increasingly devalued. Nearly a dozen colleagues attended. Not just faculty from Religious Studies, Philosophy, English, History and modern languages, which make up the College’s humanities, but Sports Studies, Economics, Justice and Policy Studies, Psychology and Art, too.

“It’s not just something on our mission statement,” says Jill. "Faculty are invested in a liberal arts education because we believe in it. We’ve seen how transformative it was in our lives, and we want that for our students.”

Transformative and practical. A recent Georgetown University study showed that a liberal arts

OUR LIBERAL ARTS

education provides a median return on investment 40 years after enrollment that approaches $918,000. That’s compared to four-year technologyrelated schools ($917,000), and business and management schools ($913,000).

But a liberal arts education can’t be measured by money alone. Alumni and faculty say their Guilford education makes them happier. “What does it matter if we train an excellent technician who is miserable because there's no joy in their life?” asks Heather. “I would much rather have students leaving Guilford, who have taken the four years with us and invest in who they are and who they want to become in a way that is not commodified, or commercially driven, but it's truly about finding their passion and their way forward in the world.”

Heather says that takes exposure to different subjects and classes. “That can't be done quickly in an engineering or nursing program,” she says. “That has to be done with the hard, messy work of learning and discovering that only a liberal arts education provides.”

Todd Woerner ’78, a Senior Lecturing Fellow at Duke University, agrees. He says his years at Guilford helped him grow not just a person but as a citizen.

“If the only language I know is that of the chemist, then my ability to see where other people are coming from is limited. It is my responsibility to read and study widely, to understand how others see the world so that I can be out in that world aware of the rich diversity around me. Guilford and the liberal arts inspire that,” he says.

“What you carry with you from your education depends on what size basket you bring to college. You get a broad education at Guilford across many disciplines. If you come, bring a big basket." •

THE LATE TED BENFEY RADICALLY ALTERED HOW TO TEACH CHEMISTRY AT GUILFORD.

A CHAMPION OF LIBERAL ARTS

In Ted Benfey’s eyes, a Guilford education required students to examine how science influences world events and everyday lives.

AFTER TAKING OVER AS DIRECTOR of the Chemistry Department in 1973, one of the late Ted Benfey’s first acts was to blow up the way Guilford students were taught in labs. At the time, Chemistry was taught using expository instruction, or “cookbook” teaching, the same pedagogical approach most

colleges and universities practiced then.

“Cookbook” teaching requires students to follow explicit instructor directions or a step-by-step manual to reach a predetermined outcome. That was the problem. Ted abhorred the practice of rote memorization at a liberal arts college like Guilford. David MacInnes,

a retired Guilford Chemistry professor and longtime colleague of Ted, says the explanatory method still found at some larger universities treats students more like numbers than individuals.

“There was no attention given to the development of student’s critical thinking skills or to the interpretation of

the results of the experiment,” says David.

Ted, says David, believed fiercely that a liberal arts college had a calling to unearth and nurture the innate curiosity and creativity within every student. When classes started that fall, there were no “cookbooks” waiting for students on their lab tables in King Hall.

“We made inquiry labs where students didn’t know what was going to happen,” says David. “Ted told them, ‘try this and see what happens and then decide what you want to do next.’”

A half century is a long time to hold on to specifics. David vaguely recalls students hesitant to the new approach. But all these years later, the lasting

impact of Ted’s new way of teaching Chemistry remains clear. “Once they became empowered, they flourished,” says David. “Not just as chemists, but as individual, critical thinkers.”

Ted and David even wrote a book on their new teaching method, which was quickly adopted by other North Carolina colleges and universities. Ted, who retired in 1988 after 15 years at Guilford, died Jan. 28, but not before instilling thousands of Guilfordians with his passion for exploring new ideas and concepts and finding those web-thin filaments connecting science, philosophy and art.

That’s certainly what Sarah Ladd ’80 remembers most about her Organic Chemistry professor. “In one class Ted would bring up history and people and politics and World War II and scientists brought to America after the war to work and tie them into the lesson that day,” says Sarah. “He would reflect on the personalities of those scientists, he would weave in Quaker principles. So technically you had this class in organic chemistry but it was also a class in history and sociology and religion. I loved every class.”

Jane Anderson ’77 was a 16-yearold first-year student at Guilford the same year Ted arrived at Guilford. She was immediately drawn to how Ted, like many Guilford professors today, had a gift for exploring and teasing out connections between seemingly disparate thoughts and encouraged students to do the same.

“He was always helping us see those kinds of connections between science and, say, a Philosophy class,” says Jane. “And there was such a sense of humility and grace in the way Ted did that — in everything he did, really. He could take the most complex, obtuse idea or theoretical system and convey

OUR LIBERAL ARTS

them in a person-on-the-street kind of language to someone like me, a college freshman, who would understand exactly what he was talking about. That way of communicating with others?

Of listening and understanding other people’s thoughts and ideas? That was a gift I learned at Guilford with Ted. I still use those thinking and communication skills in my work and life today.”

Ted had a genius for bringing science to life in Guilford’s classrooms. He was a small man in height, but students say his presence in a lab was enormous. With his gift of teaching and experiential learning, he endowed chemical principles with wide-eyed drama, hands whirling above test tubes and Bunsen burners. Amid explosions and swishing clouds of carbon dioxide he guided — never lectured — Guilford students through the mysteries of Organic Chemistry with contagious enthusiasm.

“His arms would be flying through the air with a great grin on his face,” says Sarah, a retired school teacher living in Greensboro. “You could tell how delighted he was about a chemical compound. He enjoyed it when we saw the same connections he saw and he loved it when we introduced him to concepts he’d never thought of.”

At Ted’s urging, Sarah says she enrolled in so many courses across so many disciplines that she didn’t declare a major until her senior year, yet another benefit of attending a liberal arts college like Guilford.

“Virtually any class, there was always a connection to the greater world and other disciplines,” she says. “I can’t see educating any other way.

“It hurts me when people go in learning straight Math or Organic Chemistry with little exposure to other disciplines. I’m so grateful for Ted and Guilford for offering just the opposite.” •

FIFTH YEAR QUAKER TYLER DEARMAN ’ 23 MISM ’ 24 LED GUILFORD TO THE FINAL FOUR OF THE NCAA DIVISION III MEN ’ S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT.

WHAT A RIDE

The Quakers gave us a March to remember. There’s just one problem.

NOW WHAT ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DO FOR FUN? Pardon us if we sound like a backseat full of bored children but our three-week fun ride is over, and a lot of us don’t know what to do with ourselves. Guilford’s men’s basketball team invited Guilfordians to roll down the window, enjoy the wind and the sunshine on our faces, and feel a little more alive this spring.

That's probably why the Quakers’ loss in the NCAA Division III national semifinals to Hampden-Sydney stung so much. We were having so much fun watching a group of friends play basketball that, when the end came late one evening last month in Fort Wayne, Ind., we had to turn and face our everyday lives. Where's the fun in that?

Basketball’s cognoscenti didn't give Guilford much of a chance in the tournament. Who could blame them? Based on the regular-season standings, the Quakers weren’t the best team in the Old Dominion Athletic Conference. They weren’t even second best. But the ones that did believe in Guilford were the ones that mattered. That would be the Quakers themselves.

As Guilford mowed through the brackets, it became clear that its victories were anything but upsets. The Quakers were simply an excellent team, and through a gift no one saw

coming, Guilfordians were handed a March to remember. Game-winning shots and clutch stops became regular fare. So did conversations about teamwork and defense and sacrifice. We were having a ball.

That’s right, we. Together, we became thoroughly familiar with the players. By the time the season was over, we could break down each of their games. All-American Tyler Dearman? Master handler of a basketball and an opponent’s nightmare on defense. Julius Burch? A sweet-shooting leader and tenacious rebounder with a smile that lit up Ragan-Brown Field House.

They made it easy for us to root for them and their names will stay with us for a long time. Luke and Gabe Proctor. Caleb Farrish. Rob Littlejohn. Dawson Edwards, Kyshon Tate. It was ridiculously out-of-control entertainment, fun in a concentrated formula. All of which made the ending equally painful.

There are lessons that can be gleaned from the Quakers’ run. Hard work matters. Chemistry matters. Talent, too. The Quakers wrapped those together in one unforgettable season and spun an incredible tale all the way to the Final Four.

And us? Now we get down to the business of figuring out what to do with ourselves. We have our weekends and vocal chords back, but that doesn’t seem enough after the ride these Quakers took us on. If it brings any solace, we've done the math. The 2024-25 basketball season is only seven months away. •

RIGHT: LUKE PROCTOR ’ 25 DRIVES FOR A BASKET AGAINST CHRISTOPHER NEWPORT UNIVERSITY IN THE SECTIONAL FINAL LAST MONTH.

FANS

JENSEN

THE QUAKERS DEFEATED CHRISTOPHER NEWPORT UNIVERSITY TO ADVANCE TO THE FINAL FOUR; JULIUS BURCH ’ 23 MBA ’ 24

HOISTS THE SECTIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP TROPHY; GUILFORD STUDENTS AND NATHAN PACKED RAGAN-BROWN FOR THE NCAA TOURNAMENT; JULIUS AND ROB LITTLEJOHN MBA ’ 23 CUT DOWN THE NET AFTER BEATING CNU.

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP:

STORM JACK

COURT AFTER

INTO THE WOODS

Guilford Woods has always been a popular hangout for students. For Cayce Burch ’16, the woods have been so much more.

DEEP WITHIN GUILFORD WOODS , far beyond anything resembling a beaten path, Cayce Burch ’16 stops in his tracks. He is standing amid a cluster of trees and his thoughts. It’s not uncommon for Cayce to get lost in the woods, physically and spiritually. There are afternoons, he says, he’ll drop by intent on staying for a few minutes only to linger, like old friends do, before finally excusing himself as nighttime gathers.

But on this day there is only brilliant sunshine. He closes his eyes and cranes his neck toward the sun the way the ferns at his booted feet are doing. His eyes are closed and the sun that finds its way through the canopy of hickories, maples and oaks, warms his face.

Cayce smiles before finally speaking. “This is like home,” he says, only to correct himself. “This is home.”

What is it about reveling in the great outdoors that promotes human health? Studies show that spending time in natural environments can lead to lower stress levels and higher energy. Cayce says he’s proof of that research and adds that Guilford Woods offers him something no study can measure: peace. He was a frequent visitor to the College’s woods as a student and even now, all these years later, is still drawn to the solitude it offers. Almost always he is accompanied by the Canon digital camera his late grandfather gave him for his 21st birthday. He’s produced hundreds of images of Guilford Woods, Guilford Lake and the wildlife that call both home. Some of those images will

DIGITAL BONUS

Scan the QR code to see some of Cayce’s Guilford Woods photos and hear more of his story.

be on display in the Hege Academic Commons later this year as part of an exhibit of Cayce’s work.

A barred owl, bathed in moonlight, stares down from a maple tree. Click A heron stands atop a wood piling protruding from Guilford Lake. Click Together, the images tell the story of a place many Guilfordians are fond of. Known as the New Garden Woods in the 1800s, Guilford Woods is a 240-acre tract of biodiversity that encompasses old growth forest and at least one ancient tree standing as a silent witness. The woods were a refuge for enslaved Africans seeking freedom through the Underground Railroad. In another way, they serve as a refuge for Cayce, too. His childhood was anything but ideal. Cayce’s mother, who has schizo-affective disorder, suffered a breakdown when

he was 12, and jumped off a building with his little sister. Thankfully, they both survived. His father, who passed away in 2020, suffered from addiction issues, and relapsed throughout Cayce’s middle and high school years. “By the time I was in high school I had a pretty serious grasp on mental illness, drug addiction, and homelessness,” he says. “I spent my younger years moving around a lot, I had just enough time to settle in before moving again,” he says. “There never seemed to be any stability, or anchor, until I moved to Greensboro. My stepmom, sisters, and grandma have really carried me through.”

Cayce found that anchor in Guilford Woods. He still does. “When I’m walking through the woods I recognize just how wild everything is,” he says. “And yet the woods still finds its own balance.

GUILFORD LAKE PHOTO BY CAYCE BURCH ’ 16

“[The woods] bring me an inner peace and relaxation, a sense of tranquility when I leave that I didn’t have when I went in.”

— Cayce Burch ’16

It’s still doing what it has done for a very long time, which is that it survives and continues to grow. That brings me an inner peace and relaxation, a sense of tranquility when I leave that I didn’t have when I went in.”

In some ways, Cayce knows every inch of the woods. In other ways, he says, he’s only now coming to appreciate all that it offers. On a recent hike after a winter rain he stumbled across beading water dripping off a beech tree leaf. Cayce put down his camera and stared. The water was so clear he could see the refraction of the woods behind each drop. “It was like each drop was its own little lens on the woods,” he says.

He likes coming across trees that are diseased or have been struck by lightning yet still find a way to grow. The metaphor is not lost on him.

“They’re damaged and yet they still don’t care,” he says. “At the end of the day a tree can be half of what it was a year ago but it’s still growing. That’s pretty amazing. I think all of us feel like that once in a while — some of us maybe every day.”

And there lies the pull to Guilford Woods for Cayce. “Whether it’s something in my life or a bad day at work, the woods is a place where I can go and rethink what it is I want or what I’m doing and is that the direction I want to go in?” he says. “That’s a pretty powerful influence from the woods. It’s a pretty positive influence, too.”

•

CAYCE BURCH ’ 16

SAYS GUILFORD WOODS HAS HELPED HIM BETTER UNDERSTAND HIS RELATIONSHIP WITH HIS MOTHER AND LATE FATHER.

PHOTO BY ROBERT BELL ’ 11

LOST, FOUND & RETURNED

Terry Bralley ’76 had long forgotten about his class ring that went missing 48 years ago. Then in January, his phone rang.

WHEN HIS GIRLFRIEND TOLD

HIM she’d lost his Guilford class ring just weeks after he graduated, Terry Bralley ’76 was heartbroken. He’d spent his senior year working nights to save up the $75 for the ring. He even pinched here and scrimped there to have his initials inscribed inside the band.

And less than a month later the ring was gone. There wasn’t time to dwell on the loss. Terry just graduated with a Business Management degree and had a career to pursue. Over time, he forgot about the ring. That is, until his phone rang earlier this year.

“It’s kinda funny,” says Terry, who, as president of Davie County (N.C.) Economic Development Commission, recruits businesses to the county just west of Winston-Salem. “All these years later something that meant so much to me is back in my life.”

The story of how, 48 years later, Terry and his ring were reunited starts with a plumber in Virginia. John Fazekas, who now lives in Bryson City, N.C., was refurbishing a bathroom a Naval base in Virginia Beach in the early 1990s.

One day he picked up a piece of old pipe and heard a piece of metal fall out of the back end. “It looked like a big ball of gunk,” says John. He picked up the ball and rolled it around in his gloved hands. The pipe came from a urinal, which left the ball covered in years of rust and calcified deposits. John would have thrown the object out with the pipe were it not for a

speck of shiny metal under the years of buildup. He took it home with him that night and tried chiseling off the

buildup to figure out what was trapped inside. He could tell it was a ring but not much else. “I put it in a plastic bag and stored it someplace and then came across it a year or two later and chipped away asome more,” says John. “I just kept repeating that over and over through the years.”

After a few years he could tell the ring belonged to a Guilford graduate — but who? It wasn’t until cleaning the inside band that the ring yielded a clue: The initials TLB. John called the College and asked if there were any 1976 graduates with matching initials. It took Allen Rogers, Director of Advancement Operations, 20 minutes to match the initials with Terry. An official from the College called Terry on a Friday afternoon in January. “I hadn’t thought about that ring in so long,” he told the caller. “Amazing, just amazing.”

In February, Terry and John met outside a service station in Asheville. Stories were shared, pictures were taken, and a ring once thought forever lost, was returned. Terry slid it on his finger. It was a little snug but still fit. Terry has no idea how his ring ended up lodged in a urinal’s pipe so many years ago. He doesn’t care. “I’ve got it now and that’s all that matters.”

He says the ring is in a safe place with other valuable possessions in his house. Just as valuable to Terry is the lengths John took to restore it and track down its owner. “It just restores your faith in mankind,” says Terry. “•

PHOTO COURTESY OF JOHN FAZEKAS

JOHN FAZEKAS, LEFT, MET TERRY BRALLEY ‘76 IN FEBRUARY TO RETURN HIS CLASS RING THAT HAD BEEN MISSING SINCE 1976.

A NEED FOR (REAL) SPEED

Charles Wimbley ’26 learned how to handle race cars by playing video games. He’s hoping his national success gives him a chance at the real deal.

EVER WONDER WHAT IT’S LIKE whipping into a turn at Charlotte Motor Speedway, all four tires fighting for grip, or to drift out of the narrow groove at Daytona into an unforgiving swath of rain-slick asphalt? What’s it like picking your way through the traffic of Talladega with nerves rubbed raw and Dale Earnhardt Jr. thisclose to your rear bumper?

Charles Wimbley ’26 has a good idea. Mind you he’s never been behind the wheel of a real race car — not yet, at least — but every night, he says, that childhood dream gets, like Dale Jr., closer. That’s because every night Charles puts on his headset and turns his Shore Hall dorm room into one of the world’s top race courses using an online simulation racing website.

Before you roll your eyes and dismiss Charles as just another gamer, you should know that in the competitive world of simulated racing, Charles is good. Very good. He’s hoping his skills in sim racing, as its participants call it, will help reel in that dream.

Charles wants to be a NASCAR driver. Before another round of eye rolling, you should also know this is no pipe dream. Charles and sim racers like him are following the path of a growing list of very real drivers.

When NASCAR Cup Series star William Byron was coming through the ranks, much was made of how he got his start in racing through iRacing, a subscription-based motorsports simulation platform that has become

ubiquitous throughout the racing world. Now it’s routine. Rajah Caruth, Parker Retzlaff and Kaden Honeycutt to name a few graduated from racing on their computers to racing in NASCAR's top three national touring series.

“All I’ve ever wanted to be is a NASCAR

driver,” says Charles. “People think this is just a game to me, but it’s not. A lot of sim-racers see this as a way — the best way — to break into the business.”

Just in case, Charles is taking a full load of classes at Guilford, where he's majoring in Sport Management. After

CHARLES WIMBLEY ’ 26 IS ONE OF THE TOP AMATEUR SIMULATED RACERS IN THE NATION.

PHOTO BY ROBERT BELL '11

his homework and assignments are done, he slides behind the wheel in his dorm room, logs in to his iRacing website and practices for four hours each night. Not surprisingly, he opted for a single room this year. “That’s just not fair for me to be racing until two in the morning,” he says.

A dorm room wall shows his determination. On a recent Monday, Charles’ calendar reminded him of a Psychology group presentation in the morning and a Talladega practice run that night. “Some people think I’m obsessed,” he says. “I’m

just determined. If you really want something you have to be.”

Now might be a good time to shift into reverse. When he was 8 and living with his family in Brooklyn, N.Y., Charles remembers watching Cars, the 2006 Pixar Animation movie. “I was hooked,” he says. When Cars 2 came out a few years later, Charles watched it in a theater and was not impressed.

“I remember yelling out in the theater, ‘where’s all the racing scenes?’ I didn’t care about the plot or the characters. I just wanted to see Lightning McQueen race.”

He’s had a need for speed ever since. But unlike Earnhardt, who was born into a family of drivers in racing-crazy North Carolina, it wasn't likely that Charles was going to walk outside his Brooklyn home and find a race car in front of the house for his birthday.

The family did have a computer and WiFi though, so Charles had access to iRacing and other ultra-realistic software to mimic real-life racing without having to slide into a fire suit.

He designed his own virtual car and dressed it in Guilford’s maroon, white and black. There’s even a large block G on the hood. His car is no. 37, a nod to Guilford’s inception in 1837. “I take a lot of pride in that car,” he says. “It’s an honor for me to race and represent Guilford. A lot of (other sim racers) didn’t know who Guilford was, but I’m pretty sure they know now.”

Sim racing isn’t cheap. Charles estimates he’s invested more than $2,500 in a wheel base, steering wheel, pedals and monitor. His family helps some; the rest comes from an internship he secured at Tricon Garage, a racing team that competes in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series.

It’s a 160-mile round trip commute to Mooresville, N.C., where Charles works once a week. ”It’s an awesome, hands-on experience,” he says. “Obviously, I do a little bit of everything and that includes taking out the trash, but I’m there learning how the business works. That, to me, is so worth it.”

DIGITAL BONUS

Scan the QR code to see Charles Wimbley racing and learn how he likes representing Guilford in eNascar.

In these highly realistic video games, cars obey the laws of physics and race on reproductions of real-life tracks that are accurate down to the last pavement seam. Competitions are held weekly and college students from across the nation — schools like Oklahoma State, Auburn, Duke, UNC and Ohio State — compete. That only makes it more impressive that Charles from comparatively tiny Guilford College leads most of them. Out of hundreds of collegiate racers, Charles sits in 18th place in the most recent eNASCAR College iRacing Series rankings.

Now here’s the rub: Charles says he can do better. “I know I can,” he says. “I know who I am and what I can do and I can do so much better. I just need to keep at it.”

Charles knows that, unlike Guilford, there are many colleges that offer majors related to motorsports. He chose Guilford because the College is a small-school with a big-school vibe. “We maximize all resources,” he says. “Look at our basketball team. We’re a tiny school but we nationally ranked. Our professors support us and make sure you’re maximizing your potential. I knew this place was for me the first day I visited.”

Since the school doesn’t recognize sim racing, Charles doesn’t have the same perks that Guilford’s other student-athletes have. There are no hoodies and T-shirts for the school’s lone sim racer, but he works just as hard. “It’s not just me I’m racing for,” he says. “I’m also representing Guilford. I want both of us to succeed.” •

EYE ON THE BALL

Andrew Biggadike ’02 doesn’t make the rules of golf. But starting this month at the Masters, he’ll be enforcing them.

ANDREW BIGGADIKE ’ 02 WAS A MEMBER OF GUILFORD’S 2002 NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP GOLF TEAM.

ANDREW BIGGADIKE ’02 REMEMBERS the long van rides to tournaments with his Guilford golf teammates when coach Jack Jensen would break the silence of the trip by asking a question about the rules of the game.

“It wasn’t like a trivia contest to pass time,” says Andrew. “He was doing it to make sure we all knew as much about the rules as we could. He wanted us to be prepared so if the situation ever happened, we’d be ready.”

Those pop quizzes in the van made Andrew realize just how much he didn’t know about the rules of golf. Safe to say Andrew knows the rules these days. So much, in fact, that last month, the United States Golf Association, the governing body for golf in the U.S. and Mexico, elected him to serve on the association’s executive committee. He’s the second Guilfordian to serve on the executive committee, following O. Gordon Brewer ’60, who served for five years starting in 1997.

“Gordon’s a great man,” says Andrew. “He really made an impression on me and showed me how I could have a full experience and life in the game of golf and not just as a player.”

debates like a player’s golf ball oscillating a fraction of an inch on the green, or somebody’s wedge ever-so-slightly grazing a loose impediment.

Start the round with more than 14 clubs in the bag? Even if you realize your mistake and remove a stick, that’s a twostroke penalty, pal.

Accidentally hit your tee ball while taking a practice swing? Embarrassing, but relax. You’re don’t have to play the ball. Just tee it up and, after your friends stop laughing, swing away.

“ A lot of people look at golf’s rules and hate them or find them really interesting. I’m one of those people who find them really interesting.”

Buried so deep in the rough that you can't tell if it's your ball? You are allowed to lift the ball for identification purposes, but the USGA says “the player must announce his intention to lift the ball to an opponent, fellow-competitor or marker, and mark the position of the ball. He may then lift the ball and identify it, provided that he gives his opponent, marker or fellow-competitor an opportunity to observe the lifting and replacement.”

— Andrew Biggadike ’02

As part of his job Andrew is on the rules committee. He’ll be at the Masters later this month in Augusta, Ga., and will perform the same role at the U.S. Open in Pinehurst, N.C., in June. He’ll also work at the U.S. Senior Open, U.S. Amateur and U.S. Mid Amateur later this year.

Andrew says his job at those events is pretty easy — until it’s not. He’ll be assigned a hole and will watch the world’s best golfers compete. If an issue arises on the hole, Andrew will be there to help the golfer interpret the rules.

Golf’s rules are one of the few things that connect the average weekend hacker with the PGA Tour’s best, and that the game’s elite players sometimes struggle with following, or simply just understanding, the rules as much as the rest of us.

People who know the intricate (sometimes arcane) rules of golf have a common thread. “The kinds of people who seem to gravitate towards the rules are often engineers, lawyers, those kinds of folks who deal with a lot of, maybe, coding, or like working through things logically and enjoy problem solving. A lot of people look at golf’s rules and hate them or find them really interesting. I’m one of those people who find them really interesting.”

There are few sports whose fans obsess over the rules as those who follow golf. Nothing quite sparks living-room

Got it?

“These kinds of things, they don’t happen often but when they do, that’s when you need someone who knows the rules,” says Andrew.

He remembers growing up and watching golf with his father. Ralph Biggadike, like Andrew, was a stickler for the rules. “Whenever there was a rules incident, he’d pull out the rules book and we’d start going through it and it just kind of was a neat, fun thing that we talked about,” says Andrew.

Andrew, a software engineer and manager for a New York City-based company, was a three-time All-American at Guilford and a member of the Quakers’ 2002 NCAA Division III National Championship team. He’s been a USGA committee member since 2016, and has served as a rules official at 13 USGA championships and six international team matches, including the 2017 and 2021 Walker Cup Matches. He's also served as vice president of the Amateur Golf Alliance since 2015. For years after Guilford Andrew regularly competed in elite amateur tournaments across the country. He still competes in smaller tournaments, but his wife and daughter command most of his attention these days.

“I still compete, but that means I have to be more disciplined with my time in terms of playing and getting in the practice,” he says. “If you want your game to stay strong, you have to keep playing. It’s that simple.”

A good rule to follow. •

COMMUNITY NOTES

A CAREER CAST IN BRONZE

Ned Giberson ’73 spent his days at Guilford as a fervent but peaceful objector to the Vietnam War. If there was a protest or sit-in in Greensboro, chances are Ned and his classmates were there. He even attended the May Day protests against the war in Washington, D.C., in 1971.

So it raises a few eyebrows to learn that one of Guilford’s most accomplished sculptors has amassed a large body of bronzes around fallen military soldiers from that war and other conflicts.

Ned, who received a deferment from the Navy because of a bad knee and poor hearing, sees his work differently. “I still believe war is never the answer,” he says. “But as years went by, I started seeing life and those soldiers with a new perspective. There were a lot of young men who felt the same way I did who went to Vietnam and never came back. I guess (my art) is a way of honoring those men. It might not sound like much, but it’s an honor I hope will be around for years and years. Maybe others might see it and start to think and look at war in a different light.”

Though a back injury from falling off a ladder last summer has slowed him down, Ned remains a prolific sculptor. His work can be in towns, museums and universities across Illinois, Missouri and other other states. Each tells a story about a person or community. The coal miner with a pickaxe slung over his shoulder, a young soldier killed within months of deployment by a Vietnamese sniper, a life-size rendering of the late Robert Wadlow, who at 8 feet, 11 inches remains the tallest man in the world.

“My Guilford professors never said, ‘here’s how you do it.’ They left that up to me to explore and experience.”

— Ned Giberson ’73

Ned’s next project might be his most ambitious: He’s working as a consultant on a $6 million World War II memorial and military museum just outside Grafton, Ill., to remember U.S. Armed Forces who fought in World War II.

Ned started off as a Philosophy major at Guilford. He almost dropped out before finding his passion in art. “My Guilford professors never said, ‘here’s how you do it,’” says Ned. “They left that up to me to explore and experience. That’s one of the things I enjoyed about Guilford was finding out who I was and what my talents were.” •

NED GIBERSON HANDLES THE SMALL DETAILS ON A LIFESIZE STATUE OF ROBERT WADLOW, THE WORLD ’ S TALLEST MAN. NED COMPLETED THE STATUE IN 1985.

Matt Reid ’16 releases his first album

Guilford Music Professor Matt Reid ’16 says he always wanted to release a jazz album, but the timing was never quite right. And by timing, Matt means he never could find the time.

When he’s not teaching music, he manages several apartment complexes in Greensboro. And, of course, he plays jazz after hours with two other artists in The Gate City Jazz Trio.

Eventually Matt figured out if he was ever going to make that album he needed to make the time. Last year he carved out a day here, a week there to do just that. In February, he released the fruits of that labor in the form of his first album.

Unconditional is a collection of, as Matt calls them, “jazz standards and classics.”

There are six tracks on the album, which can be streamed on most streaming platforms, including Spotify, Apple Music and Amazon. It can also be purchased on iTunes.

Matt grew up in Asheville and attended Guilford to study music. These days he’s a part-time instructor at the College.

“It was a great learning experience,” he says. “I really enjoy teaching at Guilford and maybe making it a nice experience for others.”

Corbett wrote the book on belonging

WORKERS EMERGED FROM THE pandemic with new demands, says Wendy Gates Corbett ’91. Just look at the flexible schedules and remote work companies are offering employees to hold onto them. But Wendy says one major perk that remains elusive at many companies is a sense of belonging.

And it’s not going away. “The pandemic heightened how important connection is for us,” says Wendy.

Her new book, The Energy of Belonging: 75 Ideas to Spark Workplace Community, was written with that problem in mind.

Wendy’s book is based on more than 1,500 surveys she sent to

companies big and small around the world. Wendy, a member of Guilford’s Board of Trustees, says a favorite strategy she discovered for connecting workers is one of the easiest. “I hear from so many people that they feel connected to their colleagues and leaders when those colleagues and leaders talk to them about non-work stuff,” she says.

“That doesn’t mean it has to be all day long or add a half hour to the meeting. But just a simple question about life outside of work shows others you see them as a whole person. That’s a huge and positive impact for such a small question.” •

Council of the Blind names Thornhill

SCOTT THORNHILL ’93 is the new Executive Director of the American Council of the Blind. Scott was voted in by the ACB Board in March to lead the 62-year-old organization.

“It is a prvilege and honor to lead an organization with such a rich history,” says Scott. “The strength of the Council is a combination of our members, supporters, and the larger blindness community that we serve. I look forward to us achieving even more impactful results in the years to come.”

For the past five years, Scott served as the Director of Public Policy for

Alphapointe, a non-profit organization that empowered people who are blind through job opportunities and personal development. Scott also has a background in real estate brokerage. Despite a flourishing career in that field, he felt compelled to join the effort to help make the playing field level for people who are blind and visually impaired. Scott lost his vision due to Retinitis Pigmentosa after being diagnosed at the age of eight and told at 15 he would be blind by the time he turned 40. •

COMMUNITY NOTES

Cameron Reny ’07, who is serving her first term as a Maine legislator in Senate District 13, will seek re-election in November. Cameron serves as Senate Chair of the Marine Resources Committee and as a member of the Health Coverage, Insurance, and Financial Services Committee. She also serves on the Maine Climate Council. Cameron introduced five bills that passed last year that bring local, healthy food in schools, and fund affordable initiatives in rural parts of the state.

Juan VigoyaAstroz ’20, an Economics major with a minor in Computer Technology and Information Systems, was recently named Senior Accounting Analyst at Gilbarco Veeder-Root in Greensboro. Juan has been working at Gilbarco Veeder-Root since 2022. After Guilford, Juan earned his masters in Accounting at N.C. State University. Juan also recently spoke to a group of high school students about accounting at his old high school, Page, during a lunch and learn in Greensboro.

G. Michael Murrell

IV ’87 was recently named Director at TD Securities in New York. Michael came to TD Securities after holding a similar position at Credit Suisse. Before that he was a Vice President at Deutsche Bank Securities. Michael earned a degree in Economics at Guilford and was a member of the Guilford Investment Club. After graduating from Guilford Michael worked at Goldman Sachs in Fixed Income Institutional Credit Sales. He was also a Senior Mentor for trainees.

Sonya Conway ’07

, is the Vice President of Public Affairs & Communications for American Express’ Global Services Group. Sonya once served as the Chief District Relations Officer for Guilford County Schools. She earned degrees in Justice and Policy Studies and Business Management at Guilford. At American Express, Sonya handles executive and internal communications, as well as media and key customer communications across 19 global markets.

Rashon Miller ’13 was named Head of Strategic Partnerships at finance company Kapitus in New York. Rashon, who earned degrees in Economics and Sport Management, has worked at Kapitus since 2016. He was most recently the finance company’s Senior Funding Manager.

We Want Your News

Hunter Neal ’23 MISM ’24 was recently named the events and operations coordinator for the Greensboro Sports Foundation. Hunter, a Presidential Fellow at Guilford while he pursued his master’s in International Sport Management, will help plan, coordinate and execute sporting events and programs across the city.

Share your news with classmates and friends! Submit your Community Notes online to magazine@guilford.edu. The deadline for the October issue is September 1.

REMEMBERING GUILFORDIANS

The following Guilfordians died recently, and we offer condolences to their families and friends.

A lifetime of love

They met as first years, Guilford sweethearts whose early love blossomed into so much more: the birth of six children, eight grandchildren, and a shared medical practice for 45 years. For nearly eight decades Eldora ’49 and Gene Terrell ’49 did everything together, side by side.

When Gene died Nov. 20 at 97, Eldora was heartbroken. Family members were concerned how Eldora, 94 and in poor health herself, would handle Gene’s death. Seven weeks later, on Jan. 7, Eldora died. “It was so hard for mom,” Eldora's daughter, Sara Beth Terrell '77, says. “They did everything — they spent a life — together.”

That lifetime included a shared medical practice in High Point, N.C. Gene and Eldora treated thousands of patients over the years. Some paid for their services. Others in the farming community offered vegetables in return for a doctor’s visit. Eldora chaired the Guilford County Indigent Care Task Force in the 1980s. Gene was just as busy.

Long after most doctors gave up the practice, he continued making house calls. “I’m not sure he saw being a doctor as his income but rather as his way of taking care of people,” Tom Terrell says about his father.

The Terrell and Haworth family tree of Guilford graduates rivals any of the College’s majestic trees on campus. Gene was the first Terrell to attend college; Eldora was a fourthgeneration Guilfordian. The couple earned degrees in Biology at Guilford before heading to medical school at Duke University. Sara Beth and her brother Bill Terrell ’80 are graduates. So are Bill and Sara Beth’s spouses, Donna ’82 and longtime English Professor and interim President Jim Hood ’79. Sara Beth and Jim’s two children, Julia ’06 and Daniel ’11, are sixth-generation Guilfordians.

Eldora served as a College trustee, helped launch the Friends Center and supported of the Quaker Leadership Scholars Program.

Gene was buried in December at Springfield Meeting in High Point. Eldora joined him in January. They lay in rest like they lived, side by side. •

GENE AND ELDORA TERRELL

Helen Womack adored her adopted Guilford College

IT WAS EASY TO LISTEN TO HELEN Womack speak so warmly about Guilford and assume she was a graduate from way back when. In fact Helen, who died Dec. 1, never took a single class at the College.

She was an adopted Guilfordian thanks to her marriage to Winslow Womack ’50. In 2019,

after more than 60 years associated with the College, Guilford affirmed what many already assumed was true. It awarded Helen, a Goucher graduate, honorary membership in the Guilford College Alumni Association.

Helen got to know many Guilfordians over the years when the couple visited the College. Helen worked with Winslow keeping alumni in the Washington, D.C., area connected to the College. “She loved Guilford dearly and Guilfordians returned that love,” says Winslow.

After receiving the Honorary Alumna Award, Helen said she was honored. “[The years] have been very special and I’ve lived them with friends who I feel are family. I wish I had the chance to come to Guilford, but I didn’t. Instead, I had the chance when it was the time for me to come.”

Ruth Anne Schoonmaker Hood, the mother of former interim President and English Professor Jim Hood ’79 and two other Guilfordians, died Jan. 3. Ruth was a longtime educator in Miami and, later, in Greensboro. She volunteered for 24 years at the Friends Historical Collection (now the Quaker Archives) at the College and for the American Friends Service Committee as a regional representative.

WINSLOW AND HELEN WOMACK

“

The Brothers and Sisters in Blackness Club

THIS IS THE BROTHERS AND SISTERS IN BLACKNESS CLUB from 1977. That’s me on the ground, the second from the left. I came to Guilford from northern Virginia just outside Washington, D.C.. My high school was mostly white, my neighborhood was mostly white. My dad went to an HBCU, but he wanted me to go to a school that was like the world I was going to live in. ‘Those are the people you’ll be competing with for jobs and working next to,’ he said. The club was a place for us to come together. It wasn’t that Guilford was a bad experience for Black students back then. The club just gave us a place where we could come together. We did a lot as a club, especially working with elementary students in the community. We held dances, entered a float in the homecoming parade — a lot of things. I still keep in touch with a lot of club members. Some of them I talk to every week. We weren’t Guilford’s first Black students, of course, but I like to think the club made it easier for Black students after us.˝ Kim Brown ’70

Do you have a photo and memory of Guilford you want to share for Last Look? Send them to Robert Bell at magazine@guilford.edu.