UNC Charlotte Magazine, Fall 2020

Belk College of Business celebrates 50 years of excellence Fighting the spread of COVID-19 on campus through early detection

CRUISING CAMPUS

UNC Charlotte Chancellor Sharon L. Gaber joined students and staff members for a scooter tour of some of the University’s most iconic spots, including the Popp Martin Student Union, the ‘49er Miner’ statue and the Botanical Gardens.

RYAN HONEYMAN

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MESSAGE FROM THE CHANCELLOR

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Niner Spirit in action: Record-breaking milestones, navigating unprecedented challenges, raising our profile During my very first walk around UNC Charlotte’s beautiful campus this summer, shortly after my arrival in North Carolina, the thought that dominated my consciousness was, “What an incredible opportunity.”

I noted the deliberate attention to creating a cohesive “look and feel” to the main campus’s architecture and the meticulous landscape. I realized then and now that I am experiencing the manifestation of years of purposeful planning and hard work designed to punctuate what is surely one of Charlotte’s and the Piedmont region’s greatest assets.

As I’ve settled in as chancellor, I’ve started to get to know UNC Charlotte’s most valuable resource — its people. Students, faculty, staff, alumni, donors and community partners, including state and local government representatives (page 3), have confirmed what was apparent to me before that initial stroll through campus: there is astounding substance upholding this institution’s extraordinary outward-facing impression.

Students at the center

This fall, in the midst of the global COVID-19 pandemic, Niner Nation welcomed a record-breaking incoming freshman class of just about 4,000, who arrived with an average weighted GPA of 3.9. They are joined by 2,600 transfer students and 2,400 new graduate students. Together with our returning students, our newest Niners pushed total enrollment beyond 30,000 for the first time in UNC Charlotte history — catapulting the institution to the second-largest of the UNC System’s 17 members.

Our students — diverse, smart and savvy — are the center of campus life, in person and virtually. This academic year in particular, they are demonstrating a remarkable depth of intellect, flexibility, creativity and desire to remain on track academically. Alongside them are faculty collectively dedicated to ensuring a high-quality learning experience through complex and varied teaching formats, while maintaining ongoing — and initiating new — research in their fields.

Elevating research, celebrating academics

As external support for research grows in the midst of a challenging environment, so do opportunities to elevate our researchers’ work and outcomes. Last year, support in this category set an institutional record of $52 million, with figures so far this year indicating potential for an even greater total. Several projects are outlined in this publication (pages 5-15), with special focus on UNC Charlotte’s campus-based wastewater testing process (page 16), established this fall as one measure among many to control or mitigate the effects of COVID-19. These projects have earned well-deserved national media attention, raising UNC Charlotte’s profile with key audiences.

UNC Charlotte is thriving also in terms of programmatic relevance.

This fall we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Belk College of Business and its MBA program (page 26). Likewise, the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences marks 40 years as a University mainstay (page 50). And EPIC, our Energy Production & Infrastructure Center, now bears the names of alumni Craig and Darla Albert (page 68),

whose transformative support makes possible this Center’s exceptional innovation and respected industry leadership.

My confidence in an institution’s overall direction always begins with those who lead its academic, community engagement and administrative efforts. The deans of UNC Charlotte’s academic colleges are demonstrated leaders in their fields, each valuing the student experience, interdisciplinary collaboration and the transformational impact of research (page 44). The Office of Urban Research and Community Engagement, formerly called Metropolitan Studies (page 42), will guide a coordinated approach to community-based research, scholarship and partnerships to deepen the impact of our focus on communities of all shapes and sizes. Finally, as our nation and local communities continue to grapple with social justice issues, I have appointed an interim special assistant to the chancellor for diversity and inclusion (page 41) to coordinate a strategic and integrated plan to ensure we are fostering an accessible, inclusive and equitable environment.

Campaign success

The work of UNC Charlotte — teaching, conducting research, recruiting the best and brightest students and faculty members — would not be possible without the support of our alumni and friends.

Our generous donors have made Exponential: The Campaign for UNC Charlotte (page 70), the largest and most impactful fundraising effort in the University’s history, with more than $218 million raised for scholarships, programs and campus facilities. As we close this campaign, please know that your support contributes significantly to the experience of today’s and future students.

Despite the presence of a global pandemic that affects all of us, UNC Charlotte is navigating challenges that were impossible to anticipate.

Through it I’ve witnessed the Niner spirit in action — and I’m very proud to be able to say that I am a member of Niner Nation.

Stay safe,

Sharon L. Gaber Chancellor Fall 2020

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Contents UNC Charlotte Magazine • Fall • 2020

The University of North Carolina at Charlotte

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Taking on a Pandemic UNC Charlotte employed an integrated system of diagnostic and care services to control COVID-19 on campus.

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Forward Momentum Chancellor Sharon L. Gaber, the University’s fifth chancellor, arrived during the summer and embarked on planning the institution’s future with a focus on students and research that will continue UNC Charlotte’s rise to national prominence.

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Green and Gold Drive Business The Belk College of Business celebrates its golden anniversary and that of the MBA program, which is preparing business leaders in the region and across the nation.

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Seeking Balance The Cato College of Education is at the forefront of local and national efforts to make school environments equitable for all students.

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Charting a Course for ‘Collective Impact’ Associate Provost for Urban Research and Community Engagement Byron White outlines UNC Charlotte’s efforts to ensure every child and family benefit from the region’s economic growth.

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Dynamic Deans UNC Charlotte’s newest academic leaders are eager to join Chancellor Gaber and their colleagues to address the challenges and opportunities facing the University and higher education.

50 Future-oriented

The College of Liberal Arts & Sciences marks its 40th anniversary as it continues to create, collaborate and innovate.

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A Teacher in the Making Amanda Mills, future teacher, receives an Evergreen Scholarship to help her across the finish line.

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EPIC named for alumni Craig and Darla Albert UNC Charlotte’s EPIC Building is now the Albert & Freeman Energy Production and Infrastructure Center in honor of Craig and Darla Albert.

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An Exponential Impact Exponential: The Campaign for UNC Charlotte concluded successfully with more than $218 million in funding to support scholarships, professorships and other efforts to shape UNC Charlotte’s future.

Departments 3 News Briefs

19,000 copies of this publication were printed at a cost of $.93 per piece, for a total cost of $17,718.

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49ers Notebook

Printed on recycled paper

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Class Notes

VOLUME 26, NUMBER 3

Colleen Penhall Chief Communications Officer and Associate Vice Chancellor for University Communications EDITOR Phillip Brown Assistant Director of Internal Communications CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Phillip Brown Wills Citty Jay Davis Jennifer Howe Susan Messina Jared Moon Paul Nowell Lynn Roberson Tom Whitestone ART DIRECTOR Ryan Honeyman Director of Creative Services PHOTOGRAPHERS Wade Bruton Ryan Honeyman Kat Lawrence DESIGN & PRODUCTION SPARK Publications

UNC Charlotte is published by The University of North Carolina at Charlotte, 9201 University City Blvd., Charlotte, NC 28223-0001 ISSN 10771913

EDITORIAL OFFICES Foundation Annex The University of North Carolina at Charlotte 8730 University City Blvd.

Charlotte, NC 28223 704.687.7214

Cover image by Kat Lawrence

The University of North Carolina at Charlotte is open to people of all races and is committed to equality of educational opportunity and does not discriminate against applicants, students or employees based on race, color, national origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, age or disability.

News Briefs

www.UNCC.edu

Niners elected to posts statewide and nationally Election night 2020 proved big for Niner Nation. Former Student Body President Richard Hudson was reelected to the U.S. Congress. A record 14 alumni were elected to the N.C. General Assembly, and two gained seats on the N.C. Court of Appeals.

“Alumni who choose public service represent UNC Charlotte’s remarkable academic and extracurricular

U.S. CONGRESS

depth, and the opportunities available to develop the skills, confidence and worldview to pursue a path that will make a difference for people and communities,” said Michael L. Wilson ’93, chair, Board of Trustees. “We thank these leaders for their commitment to public service and their support of Niner Nation.”

Dave Craven (R)

Cecil Brockman (D)

Randolph and Guilford counties

Guilford County

Richard Hudson

B.A. Political Science, B.S. Business

B.A. Political Science, 2006

U.S. House District 8 (R)

Administration and

B.A. History, 1996

Accounting, 2012 Kelly Hastings (R)

N.C. SENATE

N.C. HOUSE

Cleveland and Gaston counties Teaching Certificate, 2009

Terry Brown (D) DeAndrea Salvador (D)

Mecklenburg County

Jake Johnson (R)

Mecklenburg County

B.A. in Political Science, 2009

Henderson and Polk counties B.A. Political Science, 2016

B.S. Economics, 2013 Brian Farkas (D) Joyce Waddell (D)

Pitt County

Mecklenburg County

B.A. in Political Science, 2009

M.A. Education, 1973 Dean Arp (R) Vickie Sawyer (R)

Union County

Iredell County

M.S. Civil Engineering, 1999

B.A. Special Education, 1997

NORTH CAROLINA COURT OF APPEALS Fred Gore (R) Seat 5 B.S. Business Administration,

Mary Belk (D) Mujtaba Mohammed (D)

Mecklenburg County

Mecklenburg County

B.A. Political Science, 2006

B.A. History, 2008

Marketing, 1998

Jeff Carpenter (R) Seat 7 Jason Saine (R)

Ted Alexander (R)

Lincoln County

Cleveland, Gaston and

B.A. Political Science, 1995

B.A. Political Science, 1994

Lincoln counties B.A. Political Science, 1982

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UNC Charlotte sets enrollment record with more than 30,000 students UNC Charlotte is larger and more diverse than ever.

Approximately 4,000 new first-year students, 2,600 transfer students and 2,400 new graduate students began this fall, pushing total enrollment over 30,000 for the first time in UNC Charlotte’s nearly 75-year history.

“We are now the second-largest institution in the UNC System with 30,146 enrolled students,” said Chancellor Sharon L. Gaber. “This record-breaking enrollment is a testament to UNC Charlotte’s longstanding focus on affordability, accessibility and opportunity for deserving students.

Chosen for its high academic achievement, the freshman class brings an average weighted GPA of 3.9. In fact, a greater percentage of all new undergraduates earned institutional merit-based and external scholarships compared to last year’s incoming students.”

The newest undergraduate Niners, selected from more than 26,000 freshman and transfer applications, represent 91 of 100 North Carolina counties, 49 states and 25 countries. More than 2,100 are firstgeneration college students.

“Niner Nation continues to grow not only in numbers but also in terms of opportunity, diversity and outcomes,” said Joan Lorden, provost and vice chancellor for Academic Affairs. “Our outstanding faculty, academic programs, research capabilities and incredible campus experience make UNC Charlotte the first choice for many students from across the state, region and country.”

• More than 6,200 of 6,600 new undergraduates are from North Carolina.

• The freshman class is the largest in University history, 10% larger than 2019.

• Enrollment among Black/African American 4

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freshmen grew by 30% and for Hispanic freshmen 43% over last year.

Students who identify with more than one race or ethnicity jumped by 19% since last year.

Nearly 33% of the incoming class are first-generation college students. A greater percentage of new undergraduates received institutional merit-based scholarships for fall 2020, and more students also earned external scholarships when compared to last year. Honors

• • • •

College enrollment increased by 6%.

Incoming freshmen in STEM majors

represent 34% of the class.

Total graduate student enrollment is nearly 6,000, the highest number in UNC Charlotte history.

Significant graduate school growth is attributed to in-state students with 712 more enrolling than fall 2019.

Noteworthy graduate enrollment increases include the MBA program and the Graduate Certificate in Teaching.

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Throngs of students crisscross the University daily as they head to classes, labs or other campus destinations; the coronavirus pandemic necessitated the implementation of new safety measures, such as face coverings and health screenings, to keep Niner Nation safe.

The University attributes the enrollment boost in part to quick implementation of both live and pre-recorded virtual admissions events and individual attention to students’ needs. The admissions staff reached out via text, phone and email to admitted students to make sure they had all the information they needed to register for summer orientation, enroll in fall courses and join the UNC Charlotte community.

“The significance of the role our students, faculty and staff in recalibrating our enrollment efforts as a result of the coronavirus cannot be overstated,” said Claire Kirby, associate provost for Enrollment Management. “Individuals from all areas of campus life helped us to meet prospective new students where they are in this new virtual environment, leading eventually to this celebratory milestone.”

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University’s largest grant to expand national center for youth with disabilities A pair of UNC Charlotte education professors are using the University’s largestever grant to expand their national effort to improve employment, education and community integration for students and youth with disabilities.

The $20 million-plus, five-year grant from the U.S. Department of Education ups its investment in the National Technical Assistance Center on Transition for Students and Youth with Disabilities (NTACT) at UNC Charlotte.

NTACT was created in 2015 through an initial $13 million Catherine grant directed by emeritus special Fowler education professor David Test.

NTACT assists state and local education agencies, vocational rehabilitation agencies and service providers to implement practices to help students with disabilities graduate high school Valerie in preparation for postsecondary Mazzotti education and/or employment.

Catherine Fowler and Val Mazzotti from the Department of Special Education and Child Development along with grant staff, including Bettie Ray Butler of the Department of Middle, Secondary and K-12 Education, are joined by a team of researchers from six universities across the country on the project.

Data from the first five years of NTACT programming indicated states that worked closely with the center improved graduation rates for students with disabilities, increased students obtaining jobs while in high school, increased students participating in work-based learning experiences and other pre-employment transition services while in high school, increased students with disabilities enrolling in and completing a three-course sequence of Career and Technical Education courses.

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Tonya Bates

Heather Coffey

Coffey, Bates receive 2020 Teaching Excellence Awards Heather Coffey and Tonya Bates are the 2020 recipients of the Bank of America Award for Teaching Excellence and the UNC Charlotte Award for Teaching Excellence, respectively. They were honored during a virtual ceremony in September, along with the other finalists, Paula Connolly, professor, English; Eric Heberlig, professor, Political Science and Public Administration; Susana Cisneros, senior lecturer, Languages and Culture Studies; and Kathleen Nicolaides, teaching professor, Criminal Justice and Criminology.

Provost Joan Lorden said of the finalists, “Their classrooms are places of inclusion where free expression of ideas is encouraged and welcomed, and where students of different backgrounds find acceptance. They are creative. No matter what discipline they teach, they find new and inspiring methods to spark their students’ desire to learn and to grow.”

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Coffey is an associate professor in the Department of Middle, Secondary and K-12 Education and is a teacher of future teachers. She encourages a social justice mindset in her students and gets to know her students so they are comfortable sharing concerns about teaching in environments that do not mirror their own experiences.

She helped develop the interdisciplinary Civic Minor in Urban Youth and Communities as well as the University’s Quality Enhancement Plan, Prospect for Success. A former middle school and high school educator, Coffey designed and directs the new model for the Teaching Fellows program and is the director of the UNC Charlotte Writing Project, part of the National Writing Project.

Bates, ’97 ’01 M.S. is a senior lecturer and leader within the Department of Biological Sciences who incorporates active learning, inquiry-based learning

and technology in the classroom. Her courses, including high-enrollment, general education classes for non-majors, are strongly student-centered and focus on realworld applications and scientific literacy in an effort to better connect students with the material.

By adopting a flipped classroom and other active learning approaches and by using learning assistants in large classes, Bates provides opportunities for students to work collaboratively and to receive individual assistance.

Bates, who received both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree from UNC Charlotte, facilitates workshops for middle and high school science teachers, serves as a judge for K-12 science fairs, volunteers with the regional Science Olympiad competition and serves on UNC Charlotte’s Science and Technology Expo planning committee.

She also has extended her impact through training and mentoring University faculty.

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Wade Bruton

Chancellor Emeritus Philip L. Dubois

Dubois receives ACE Council of Fellows/Fidelity Investments Mentor Award Philip L. Dubois, chancellor emeritus of UNC Charlotte, is the 2020 recipient of the ACE Council of Fellows/Fidelity Investments Mentor Award. He received the award in recognition of his commitment to advancing the American Council of Education efforts to strengthen America’s postsecondary educational system.

As chancellor of UNC Charlotte and president of the University of Wyoming, Dubois actively participated in the American Council of Education Fellows Program. During the past three decades, he mentored

seven ACE Fellows and nominated two faculty members for program participation: Cheryl Brown, Alfred Bryan, Wilma Henry (co-mentored with former chancellor Jim Woodward), Ryan Johnson, Jeffrey Leak, Barbara Lyman, Karen Morgan, Joseph Morreale and Alan Shoho.

“Philip Dubois has been a friend to the ACE Fellows Program for so long and contributed in so many ways to the success of the program and the growth and professional development of the Fellows he has engaged with,” said Sherri Hughes, assistant vice president for professional learning at ACE. “I am delighted to honor his commitment and generosity with this year’s Council of Fellows/Fidelity Investments Mentor Award.”

“Of all the things I’ve done as chancellor, helping prepare our future leaders in higher education is surely the most meaningful,” said Dubois.

Distinguished alumnus joins Obama Foundation Board of Directors UNC Charlotte alum and longtime supporter Demond T. Martin, an investor and philanthropist, has joined the Obama Foundation’s Board of Directors.

Martin ’97 is a partner at Adage Capital Management in Boston, where he has invested in the consumer sector for nearly 20 years. He has an MBA from Harvard Business School and an accounting degree from UNC Charlotte.

“I firmly believe in the transformative power of education and the work the Obama Foundation is doing to provide leadership training and resources to influence positive change in communities,” said Martin. “President Obama’s belief that we cannot wait for change but rather that we are the change, emboldens me for the path ahead and the investments I will make in this important work.”

Martin served in the Clinton White House

as assistant to Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles, and as a member of the UNC Charlotte Foundation Board. He and his wife Kia have focused their philanthropic efforts on addressing the gaps created by racial and social injustice, with emphasis in education and health care.

Through their family foundation, Demond and Kia Martin have engaged in many initiatives, including the Martin Scholars at UNC Charlotte, the King Boston memorial, the Tonia Taylor Fund for Health Equity at Dana Farber Cancer Institute and the BSI program at Berklee College of Music.

Demond Martin is a trustee of the Berklee College of Music and the Dana Farber Cancer Institute.

In 2016, Martin joined with Karen Popp ’80 to make a generous gift to the University and the student union was officially named the Karen A. Popp and Demond T. Martin Student Union.

Demond Martin

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Dance Professor Karen Hubbard featured in jazz dance history film

Africana Studies Professor Tanure Ojaide awarded international fellowship

A documentary about the history of jazz dance features Associate Professor of Dance Karen Hubbard among its contributors. “Uprooted: The Journey of Jazz Dance” has garnered awards and positive reviews since its premiere in July, including Best Musical Documentary in the Rhode Island International Film Festival and Best of Festival (Feature) in the Dance on Camera festival.

Hubbard, who has danced on Broadway, television and film (including the movie version of “The Wiz”), is a noted jazz dance scholar. Most recently, her article, “The Authentic Jazz Dance Legacy of Pepsi Bethel,” appeared in the book “Jazz Dance: The History of its Roots and Branches” (2014). At UNC Charlotte, she teaches the course Vintage Jazz. “‘Uprooted: The Journey of Jazz Dance’ shifts focus from the European aesthetic to a more inclusive and accurate version of jazz dance history, beginning with the dancing of enslaved Africans held captive

Tanure Ojaide, Frank Porter Graham Distinguished Professor of Africana Studies, has received a Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship from the Institute of International Education to share his expertise with students and Tanure Ojaide faculty in Africa.

Ojaide will be in residence for three months at the University of Abuja in Nigeria, once COVID-19 restrictions permit. He will collaborate on research with graduate students and faculty members, especially in oral and written African literatures, and assist the University of Abuja in strengthening its programs in these areas.

One of today’s leading African writers, Ojaide is among the most decorated faculty poets in the UNC System. He has won more than a dozen book prizes and accolades, including the 2018 Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa, the Commonwealth Poetry Prize, Cadbury Poetry Prize and the Association of Nigerian Authors’ Poetry Award.

in the U.S.,” Hubbard said. “I consider it an honor to have been asked to share my expertise along with jazz dance luminaries like Debbie Allen and Chita Rivera and to see visuals of my authentic jazz dance mentor Pepsi Bethel (Greensboro native, deceased artistic director of N.Y.-based Authentic Jazz Dance Theatre) in the final version.”

ESPN’s The Undefeated commissions alumnus for special posters Alumnus Adé Hogue ’12 was commissioned by The Undefeated, a sports and pop culture website owned and operated by ESPN, to illustrate the words of Black athletes and leaders “using their platform to speak up for what’s right.”

Hogue has frequently provided design work for civic Adé Hogue and activist causes and was excited to provide posters “to support those out there fighting for the health and safety of people of color.”

The resulting posters are free downloads from The Undefeated website.

A designer and lover of hand-created type and lettering, Hogue embarked on a career with Chicago creative firms after graduation; he rose to the position of art director while working with national and global brands such as PayPal, eBay Inc., ALDI, Ocean Spray, the Got Milk campaign and more.

Hogues’s freelance work for brands include The Atlantic, Netflix, the Obama Foundation, Nike, Chili’s, Under Armour, The Undefeated and Nick Jr. among others. He works as a freelance designer and type artist while teaching design at DePaul University in Chicago.

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School of Data Science receives Inspiring Programs in STEM Award UNC Charlotte’s School of Data Science recently received the 2020 Inspiring Programs in STEM Award from INSIGHT Into Diversity magazine, the largest and oldest diversity and inclusion publication in higher education. The Inspiring Programs in STEM Award honors colleges and universities that encourage and assist students from underrepresented groups to enter the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

Winners were selected based on efforts to inspire and encourage a new generation of young people to consider careers in STEM through mentoring, teaching, research, and successful programs and initiatives.

Doug Hague, executive director of UNC Charlotte’s School of Data Science, stated, “One of the core missions of our program is to make the field of data science accessible to students of all backgrounds. We’re excited to see our data science students transform corporations, governments and communities through the appropriate use of data.”

INSIGHT Into Diversity magazine selected the School of Data Science for its continued efforts to move the dial for women and minorities in STEM. Through strategic recruitment efforts, thought-provoking conversations with industry leaders and academic partnerships, the school has graduate programs that reflect diverse cohorts, with more than 45 percent female and 30 percent international students and underrepresented minorities.

Setting the pace for student access and success When it comes to ensuring student success in college, UNC Charlotte is meeting or exceeding goals set by the UNC System as outlined in its 2017-22 Strategic Plan.

UNC Charlotte’s progress in the overall graduation rate, the completion rate among low-income students, undergraduate degree efficiency, critical workforce credentials and research productivity is contributing significantly to System-wide student success that far exceeds the national average.

“UNC Charlotte recognizes the importance of a college degree for careers of the future, and we want every student to finish what they start,” said Joan Lorden, provost and vice chancellor for Academic Affairs. “Changes in our economy and our society are demanding more of our citizens: broader skills, deeper knowledge and greater competitiveness.”

Between 2010 and 2018, UNC Charlotte’s five-year graduation rate jumped from 59% to nearly 68%, exceeding the current institutional goal of 64.8% and earning national recognition from the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU). More UNC Charlotte graduates are completing their degrees faster than the national average, which stands at 58% for U.S. students who began college in fall 2012 and who had completed their degree six years later, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.

Undergraduate degree efficiency, a measurement of bachelor’s degrees awarded per 100 full-time equivalent students and that indicates how quickly graduates enter the workforce, has risen to nearly 26%, outpacing the UNC System’s benchmark of 23.5%.

The University also closed the gap in undergraduate degree efficiency between underrepresented minority and non-underrepresented minority students by 50% by 2019-20, reaching the UNC System’s target in this area two years ahead of schedule.

UNC Charlotte specializes in providing comprehensive and coordinated studentcentered programs that meet the needs of its diverse student population, a large percentage of whom are first-generation college students.

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“MY WORK WITH SPEED DEMON IS APPLIED AERODYNAMICS. IT IS TAKING THE THEORY AND THE ANALYSIS WE SEE IN COMPUTER SIMULATIONS, APPLYING IT TO THE CAR, AND SEEING IT WORK AT MORE THAN 400 MILES PER HOUR.” — C H ARL ES J E N C KES

Charles Jenckes with record-setting Speed Demon

Aerodynamics expertise helps Speed Demon set world record As the aerodynamicist for the Speed Demon 715 Streamliner team, Charles Jenckes had the job of making the 400-mile-per-hour-plus vehicle stable without increasing its drag. The UNC Charlotte assistant professor succeeded in his task, and the Speed Demon 715 car recently reached 481 miles per hour to set the record as the world’s fastest piston-powered wheel-driven ground vehicle.

A faculty member in the Lee College of Engineering’s Mechanical Engineering Department, Jenckes puts into practice the theory and knowledge he teaches in the classroom to make the Speed Demon 715 car its best. In addition to working with the Speed Demon team, Jenckes has been a racing professional for more than 30 years.

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Fluid Dynamics (CFD) Department for the Haas F1 Team.

“My work with Speed Demon is applied aerodynamics,” Jenckes said. “It is taking the theory and the analysis we see in computer simulations, applying it to the car, and seeing it work at more than 400 miles per hour.”

For the Speed Demon car, Jenckes said the three major components of the project were the build of the vehicle, the engine and the aerodynamics. The challenge of doing a total aerodynamic redesign of the car was to make it safer and more stable, without adding any drag that would slow it down.

“With this design challenge for a vehicle that runs in excess of 400 mph you can’t leave anything unattended,” Jenckes said. “When we do aero designs for Formula One or NASCAR, we use a lot of wind tunnel testing but that wasn’t available for this project. So, my work

involved hundreds of hours of computer analysis and hundreds of CFD runs. It all worked, and we were able to solve the key issues from the aerodynamic design standpoint.”

Steve Watt, the project manager for Speed Demon, said Jenckes’s involvement was a huge boost to the team. “Charles’s aero knowledge as a Ph.D. is a tremendous asset to what we do. The car is so data-driven that his help and the work of the other three guys dealing with the huge amounts of data is what made it possible to achieve the records this year.

During Bonneville Speed Week 2020, Speed Demon 715 posted a two-way average of 470.015 mph, setting a land-speed record for a piston-driven ground vehicle. It also set a top speed of 481.576 mph in the last mile, which is the fastest a piston-powered, wheeldriven ground vehicle has ever gone.

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Sonyia Richardson joins statewide task force on health inequities

The 2020 UNC Charlotte NASA Student Launch team, front row, left to right, Max Peterson, Tyler Ainsworth, David Clifton, Dan Cornett, Tyler Watkins and Aryan Gupta; back row, Jackson Smith, David Black, Gunner Petrea, Jacen Mott and Alex Dechant. Not pictured, Samantha McKinney.

49er Rocketry team places second in NASA event The UNC Charlotte Rocketry team, made up of Lee College of Engineering undergraduates from mechanical, systems, electrical and computer engineering and mechanical engineering technology, finished second overall and first in the payload portion of the 2020 NASA Student Launch competition.

Although the program was delayed and the annual launch finale event in Huntsville, Alabama, canceled, 54 teams competed remotely in the design, building and testing portions of the competition. NASA announced virtually the overall and category winners of the competition. The top overall teams were Vanderbilt University, UNC Charlotte and the University of Alabama Huntsville.

Teams earned points for progress and successes during the eight-month competition. Awards were presented in multiple categories including payload design, safety, best social media presence and STEM outreach.

The UNC Charlotte team won the Best Payload Design award. Its payload was a two-part system with the first part detecting the sample retrieval area during the rocket’s descent. The information was then relayed to an unmanned aerial vehicle, which, using integrated computer vision and obstacle avoidance navigated to the retrieval area, collected the simulated lunar ice, then moved at least 10 feet away from that site with the sample safely stored.

In the Best Vehicle Design category, the UNC Charlotte team placed third. The category scores teams for the most creative, innovative and wellconstructed rocket design for carrying the payload, while maximizing safety and efficiency.

UNC Charlotte also placed third in the Safety Award category, which is given to teams who meet all safety expectations and have the highest-quality documentation of safety designs and procedures.

Gov. Roy Cooper has appointed UNC Charlotte Social Work Professor Sonyia Richardson to a statewide task force on health inequities.

As a member of the 35-person Andrea Harris Social, Economic, Environmental and Health Equity Task Force, Richardson will work with leaders from across North Carolina to identify best practices to create economic stability, eliminate health disparities, and achieve environmental justice in North Carolina. Richardson is serving on a subcommittee focused on education.

“I plan to bring an intersectional perspective as an African American female social worker, educator, researcher and citizen,” Richardson said. “I want to provide insight for best practices that will offer healing and equity for marginalized communities.

And as my research focuses on the intersection of social work and education, this committee provides an opportunity for me to provide a unique, interdisciplinary perspective.”

Sonyia Richardson

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Solving a formerly unsolvable drinking water challenge When Civil Engineering doctoral student Amir Alansari learned of a drinking water treatment challenge that no one had been able to solve for almost 50 years, he knew he had to give it a try.

Alansari, who began his Lee College of Engineering career as an undergraduate in 2007, before completing a master’s degree, has been working toward his Ph.D. since 2013.

Originally from Dubai, he became interested in drinking water during his junior year, when he conducted undergraduate research on desalinization. He expanded his research scope to more complex topics of water treatment during his graduate studies.

“I like drinking water research, because it involves so many disciplines, including engineering, biology and chemistry,” Alansari said. “The more I study it, though, the more I realize how much I don’t know. But it is an essential problem for the entire planet and for me the research is fascinating.”

Alansari’s doctoral research focuses on how to predict and optimize drinking water treatment in order to produce cleaner water more efficiently. Because of the huge number of variables involved in water treatment, it is a research challenge that has baffled scientists and engineers for decades.

Two of the main components of water treatment are sedimentation, where water is kept still and particles are allowed to settle to the bottom, and filtration, where water is run through filter media (such as sand) to remove particles. The problem is that most particles in water are too small to settle or

Amir Alansari’s new jar-test method enables him to test a number of watertreatment variables.

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Amir Alansari

filter on their own. If particles can be made to stick together and become larger, they can be more effectively removed through the two processes.

Getting the particles to stick together, or coagulation, is achieved by adding chemicals (coagulants) to water. Coagulation is the first and most important step of drinking water treatment, because the efficiency of every subsequent process is directly dependent on the efficiency of coagulation.

There are at least 15 variables that impact the performance of the coagulation process, including water chemistry, weather, pH levels and the individual characteristics of each treatment plant, and all of these variables change constantly.

“Most of the coagulation studies done in the past were either site-specific or focused on one variable, and hence did not apply to

most real-world conditions,” Alansari said.

“Developing a universal and practical model of coagulation has been a near-impossible task, because of the chemical complexity of water and the sheer number of factors and their interactions that determine the performance of the coagulant.”

To succeed where others had failed, Alansari first designed and built a jar-test apparatus that better mimics water-treatment plants by including sedimentation and filtration stages.

The apparatus has six side-by-side jar sections, which allows variables to be adjusted in each and results compared immediately.

“I had to kind of reinvent how we do jar testing,” Alansari said. “A traditional jar test didn’t include a filtration stage. My setup represents everything that goes on in a treatment plant.”

Using the new jar-test method, Alansari concentrated on analyzing six of the primary water-treatment variables. He also created 16 different types of synthetic (manmade) water to mimic streams, lakes and other water systems.

James Amburgey, associate professor of Civil Engineering and Alansari’s graduate mentor, said, “He took a jar-test method that didn’t work and made it work and now by using machine learning, he is creating his own computer model. No one has been able to do this before.”

Alansari is employing machine-learning techniques, a subset of artificial intelligence that use computer algorithms to improve automatically through experience, to take the guess work out of treating water.

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Belk College leads among real estate schools UNC Charlotte’s Belk College of Business is one of 2020’s Leading Schools for Real Estate, according to a national industry publication. The Belk College is the only business school in the Carolinas to make Commercial Property Executives’ list, which features institutions that

demonstrate a commitment to developing tomorrow’s leaders in the real estate industry.

Through the Childress Klein Center for Real Estate (CKCRE), Belk College offers a multidisciplinary Master of Science in Real Estate (MSRE) that provides students

with the skills necessary to analyze, evaluate and execute complex real estate investment and development transactions. The center’s collaborations help students stand out in the job market, as reflected in the 100 percent employment rate for MSRE graduates in 2019.

Colleen Hammelman receives NSF award to study foodscapes Colleen Hammelman, an assistant professor in the Department of Geography and Earth Sciences, has received a National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development Program (CAREER) grant Colleen Hammelman to study population change and gentrification in urban foodscapes.

With this five-year funding, expected to total $461,555, Hammelman will investigate the impact of changing urban economies on landscapes created and used by underrepresented populations. Her research broadly considers questions of social justice in urban food systems.

Hammelman’s project will systematically investigate the ways that restaurants, groceries, food trucks and other elements are changing urban landscapes; where and how new foodscapes are constructed; and the implications of this relocation on cultural, social and economic outcomes for diverse groups. Research results will make visible the impacts of development decisions on diverse communities while advancing theory in urban geography and food studies.

Juan Meneses

English professor to conduct research during National Humanities Center residency Associate Professor of English Juan Meneses will spend four weeks in residency at the National Humanities Center in the Research Triangle Park completing the third chapter of his second book, tentatively titled “Denizens! On Foreigners, Visitors and Other Outsiders.”

Meneses will join a select group of about 40 scholars from across the nation selected for this research residency, with the timing guided by the state’s protocol on COVID-19.

For his book, Meneses is considering the idea of denizenship, as reflected in a number of works of literature, film and other creative media.

“A notion first used in medieval England, denizenship was employed to describe the status of foreigners who nonetheless enjoyed certain legal and political rights in the country,” he said. “Denizenship designated a difference in status with respect to citizens enjoying full rights while, simultaneously, blurring the line that divides citizens from figures such as the ‘alien national’ or the ‘non-native.’”

In particular, Meneses will look at ecological dimensions of this issue, investigating how environmental questions exert important pressures on belonging, national identity and global solidarity, among other aspects.

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Geology-Mechanical Engineering pairing results in novel, award-winning findings Since 2012, Martha Cary (Missy) Eppes and Russ Keanini have teamed up to conduct research, resulting in recent recognition as the 2020 recipients of the Kirk Bryan Award for Research Excellence from the Council of the Geological Society of America.

Eppes, a professor of Earth Sciences in the Department of Geography and Earth Sciences, is a field geologist with 20 years of experience measuring natural cracks on rocks outdoors. Keanini, a professor in the Mechanical Engineering Department, has almost 30 years of experience as an expert in computational statistical analysis.

In their 2017 publication “Mechanical weathering and rock erosion by climatedependent subcritical cracking,” Eppes and Keanini, for the first time, demonstrated that water likely influences all types of rock cracking at Earth’s surface whether it requires water or not.

The researchers used classical mathematical models combined with a compendium of fracture mechanics theory and data from engineering research to achieve their results. They also showed that cracking proceeds even when only extremely low stresses are applied to the rock. These stresses can be due to occurrences as simple and ubiquitous as daily heating and cooling by the sun, they noted.

Missy Eppes and Russ Keanini have, for the first time, demonstrated that water likely influences all types of rock cracking at Earth’s surface whether it requires water or not.

“Our work suggests that climate influences weathering in an unexpected, previously unrecognized way,” said Eppes. “Without weathering, there can be no soil and sediment and perhaps no life. Our research shines a light on an entirely new factor that controls how weathering proceeds that must be factored into predictions of how Earth will respond to ongoing global change.”

Eppes noted the drawdown of carbon

Christopher Cameron named American Council of Learned Societies Fellow Associate Professor of History Christopher Cameron was named a 2020 Fellow of the American Council of Learned Societies; he was one of 81 selected from nearly 1,200 applicants.

ACLS fellowships are among the most prestigious research honors in the humanities. Cameron was chosen as the 14 UNC CHARLOTTE magazine

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ACLS Oscar Handlin Fellow in American History and will receive $50,000 to support his work.

Cameron’s book project, “Liberal Religion and Race Christopher in America,” will explore the Cameron history of African Americans’ engagement

dioxide out of the atmosphere by the weathering of silicate minerals is one of the few ways that Earth can cool itself.

“Our study suggests that warmer and wetter climates, like those predicted for the next hundred years, will cause rocks to crack more quickly, which subsequently will result in more chemical weathering that could draw carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and thus cool Earth,” stated Eppes.

with religious liberalism from the First Great Awakening of the 1740s to the founding of Black Lives of Unitarian Universalism in 2015. African Americans were among the founders of the first Universalist churches in the 18th century, created their own liberal congregations beginning in the 19th century and have continually pushed Unitarians and Universalists to be more attuned to social injustices.

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Lewis named to statewide task force, receives national mentor award

Architecture teams place among top 10 in international competition Two projects by UNC Charlotte School of Architecture graduate students are among the winners of the 2020 AIA COTE Top 10 for Students Competition, presented by the American Institute of Architects Committee on the Environment (AIA COTE) in partnership with the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA).

“Bio Tower: A Green Medical Research Hub,” by Sophia Bullock, Drake Cecil and Alex King, and “[Up]–LIFT Technology Tower,” by Bekim Sejdiu and Devin Waddell, were the winning projects from UNC Charlotte. All five students recently graduated with Master of Architecture degrees. Architecture faculty Kyoung-Hee Kim and Liz McCormick mentored both projects.

“Bio Tower: A Green Medical Research Hub” responds to the loss of tree canopy that Charlotte will experience as it continues to grow. The tenants for the Bio Tower include medical clinics, pharmaceutical production companies and sales offices. “[Up]–LIFT Technology Tower” seeks to address Charlotte’s economic mobility crisis in a sustainable urban community tower that incorporates access to training in fields related to technology and startup spaces for tech businesses.

Urban education professor Chance Lewis was appointed to a statewide task force on educational equity and inclusion. He also received a Spencer Mentor Award that includes a $10,000 grant.

Lewis, who leads the UNC Charlotte Urban Education Collaborative, Chance Lewis joins the 32-person task force composed of parents, educators, administrators, education advocates, representatives of state and local government, University of North Carolina and North Carolina Community College systems and employers with a presence in the state.

In North Carolina, the traditional K-12 student population is close to 50% students of color, but only 20% of public school teachers are of color. Research shows that all students, particularly students of color, are more successful in school when they have a diverse teaching population leading their classrooms.

Representation and inclusion lead to equity for all students.

“My priority is to provide expert advice on research-based practices that have been shown to be effective in recruiting and retaining teachers of color in public schools,” Lewis said. “It is my hope that my contribution to this task force will assist in providing all public school districts with guidance on how to get high-quality diverse teachers in every school.”

The Spencer Mentor Award recognizes those with a strong history of mentorship and who demonstrate extraordinary contributions to supporting the research training and career trajectories of graduate students and junior scholars.

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The Department of Bioinformatics draws wastewater samples from 20 campus buildings, primarily residence halls, several times weekly to test for the presence of COVID-19, making possible the identification of the presence of the virus among building residents prior to the onset of symptoms.

Taking on a pandemic An integrated system of diagnostic and care services help control COVID-19 on campus

BY SUSAN MESSINA

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ampling and testing wastewater from the sewer lines leading to UNC Charlotte’s residence halls is by no means a glamorous process, but it’s vital to the multi-department, interdisciplinary — and largely successful — effort to control the presence and spread of COVID-19 this fall on UNC Charlotte’s campus.

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training campus-based contact tracers — is that it was developed and is being managed entirely by UNC Charlotte faculty, staff and students,” said Rick Tankersley, vice chancellor for Research and Economic Development. “Everyone has rallied — during a crisis that has no roadmap — to lend their expertise and do what’s best for the entire campus community.”

Planning started last summer as colleges and universities nationwide grappled with deciding whether or not to open their campuses as COVID-19 continued to elude public health

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professionals and government leaders. With a decision at UNC Charlotte to start classes online and delay a limited student move-in until late September, the University gained a few extra weeks to implement, in collaboration with the Mecklenburg County Health Department, a plan of action whose numerous and interconnected components were coordinated predominantly by the University’s Office of Safety and Security.

“Overall, UNC Charlotte students, faculty and staff have complied with the preventive protocols in place, such as following social distancing guidelines, wearing masks in the campus’s public spaces and using the hand sanitizing supplies available in all facilities,” said Robert Jones, M.D., the University’s medical director. “We knew, however, that to avoid a major outbreak of COVID-19, a robust and integrated clinical and administrative effort would be required. UNC Charlotte has risen to the occasion.”

Niner Health Check and Contact Tracing Every morning, students, faculty and staff receive a message with a link to Niner Health Check, a survey tool developed by UNC Charlotte’s Office of OneIT, which prompts respondents to report whether since the previous day they have been tested for, diagnosed with or have begun to experience symptoms of COVID-19, or had contact with a diagnosed individual. Depending on the answers, participants are instructed whether or not to come to campus, to be tested for COVID-19 or monitor symptoms from home.

“The survey tool initiates a series of services, protocols and actions designed to identify, locate, inform and care for those on campus affected directly

by COVID-19,” said Patrick Versace, assistant vice chancellor for Enterprise Applications. “With an overall 98% compliance rate regarding the survey, we can be confident that Niner Health Check is making a difference on UNC Charlotte’s campuses.”

Those who indicate exposure or a diagnosis are instructed to begin quarantine or isolation, including resident students who move to designated spaces on campus where their health needs are addressed and meals are delivered. University contact tracers, led by Keith Carnes ’07 MHA, ’16 Ph.D., research assistant professor in the Department of Public Health Sciences, are alerted to begin the process of determining who had close proximity to the infected person and communicate with them to determine if testing or quarantine is appropriate. His team includes master’s and doctoral students from the public health sciences program that have been trained to conduct these investigations.

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The Office of Safety and Security, led by Associate Vice Chancellor John Bogdan (standing), manages logistical details related to mitigating COVID-19 on campus, including tracking faculty, staff and students who are tested and in quarantine or isolation for daily dashboard updates.

COVID-19 Test Clinic and Processing Lab Medical personnel from the Student Health Center (SHC) have worked most of the fall semester in a large tent set up near the SHC for the singular purpose of administering COVID-19 tests to faculty, staff and students instructed to get them based on their Niner Health Check results. They also regularly test several 49ers teams (in collaboration with an outside vendor that manages the rest). Tests conducted there are transported to a lab in Cameron Hall that has been upfitted — and for which federal CLIA (Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments) certification has been obtained to process human samples — to run up to several hundred tests per day, if needed. Additionally, the lab team, in collaboration with OneIT, installed software programs designed to support clinical and laboratory workflow, laboratory outreach, point-of-care testing, data analytics and HIPAA security.

“There was a University-wide willingness to create a COVID-19 test processing lab to provide fast, accurate and timely results, especially with the supply chain challenges that hospitals and testing facilities across the country have experienced,” said Angelica Martins, interim director, Research and Economic Development, who directs the COVID-19 Testing Center.

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NiCole Lynch

Niner Health Check, a daily digital survey tool that asks Niners to report on their health status, was developed by OneIT’s Jason Dominiczak, a solution architect who also created the COVID-19 website dashboard and a digital tool that allowed campus community members to attest to whether or not they’d had a flu shot.

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Kat Lawrence

Cynthia Gibas from Bioinformatics and Mariya Munir from Civil and Environmental Engineering test collected wastewater in labs located in the Bioinformatics building and EPIC. All protocols and facilities for their work meet guidelines of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Wastewater Surveillance System.

Wastewater Sampling and Testing UNC Charlotte is one of several institutions nationwide to invest in campus-based wastewater testing, which involves extracting samples from the sewer lines leading to 28 campus locations,

primarily residence halls, either manually or by autosampler, a process that serves as a coronavirus early-warning system.

“Traces of the virus in wastewater precedes the onset of symptoms in individuals,” said Cynthia Gibas, bioinformatics researcher, who is leading the project with Environmental Engineer Mariya Munir, whose expertise includes the quantitative detection of DNA/RNA. “Working closely with Facilities Management, we are able to pinpoint the presence of COVID-19 in a particular building, which can expedite the process of identifying infected individuals.”

This broad based, multi-college undertaking, which meets guidelines set by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Wastewater Surveillance Program, includes expertise provided by faculty and postdoctoral researchers from the Department of Bioinformatics and Genomics, the Department Civil and Environmental Engineering, the Department of Geography and Earth Sciences, the Department of Computer Science and the Department of Public Health Sciences.

N.C. General Assembly appropriates funds for COVID-19 research at UNC Charlotte This fall, the North Carolina General Assembly appropriated $9 million in CARES (Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security) Act funding to UNC Charlotte for groundbreaking COVID-19 research. This investment represents the largest research appropriation to the University.

Legislative interest in this project aligned with Chancellor Sharon L. Gaber’s focus to apply research and data to the reopening of campus safely this fall in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. Her approach follows the leadership of her predecessors James H. Woodward, whose vision launched the University’s bioinformatics program now leading campus efforts to test wastewater at several locations, and Philip L. Dubois, whose commitment to academics and research led to their significant growth.

Championed by Rep. Jason Saine ’97 of Lincoln County, who serves as co-chair of Appropriations, and Rep. Becky Carney of Mecklenburg County, who is a co-chair of the House Select Committee on COVID-19 Health Care Working Group, the effort received wide bipartisan support. Legislators readily acknowledged that the University is focused on innovative research and practical solutions that address today’s problems and enable the

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Rep. Becky Carney

Rep. Jason Saine

development of healthier communities for the future.

Rep. Saine stated, “I can’t express how proud I am of UNC Charlotte. The world is learning what alumni already know. That our school is a top-notch university and that our research is meaningful and really can impact people’s daily lives. To see our University’s work on COVID-19 solutions get the needed funding it deserves is more validation for the work already happening on campus as well as what lies ahead. Already, this research has been noted nationally and I couldn’t be more proud to be associated with this investment.”

“Over the years, I have seen the research at UNC Charlotte grow and solve important problems and issues in our community. I was proud to urge my colleagues from across the state to include this project in the COVID-19 package,” Rep. Carney added.

Wastewater testing, in its current application within a college campus environment, allows the University to analyze the effectiveness of this approach in a congregate living setting. Legislators recognize that the findings of this research could be applicable to towns, cities and counties for similar investigations at a neighborhood level as well as to K-12 or similar settings to foresee and abate outbreaks.

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An up-to-the-minute COVID-19 Dashboard An online dashboard designed cooperatively by the Office of Emergency Management and the Office of OneIT provides information to the wider community about UNC Charlotte’s COVID-19 status. Updated daily with data provided by multiple sources (with the exception of on-campus testing statistics, which occurs weekly), the dashboard offers a timely illustration of health trends on campus.

“We’re committed to keeping the public informed about new cases reported daily and the number of active cases at any given time,” said Chris Gonyar ’05, ’07 MPA, director of Emergency Management. (Visit the dashboard: emergency.uncc.edu/covid-19-dashboard.)

On the safe side At various times this fall, the University made a decision to initiate surge testing and surveillance testing, additional strategies designed to preempt outbreaks. The

purpose of both types is to sample the campus community to identify possible asymptomatic cases and to monitor for increasing or decreasing prevalence of the virus. Surge testing involves testing everyone in a determined environment, such as in a residence hall or on a sports team, whereas surveillance testing is random.

“The response to surge testing and surveillance testing on campus has been strikingly positive,” said Tankersley. “While faculty and staff have done a tremendous job of creating systems that are contributing to what appears to be a successful fall semester in terms of controlling COVID-19 on campus, the majority of the students are doing their part to keep themselves and other Niners as safe as possible. We anticipate a similar level of shared understanding and cooperation for the remainder of the 202021 academic year.”

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The New York Times ran a front page story on Aug. 30 that featured details about UNC Charlotte’s wastewater sampling and testing protocols. The story reported the efforts of universities nationwide to develop ways to open and operate safely during the coronavirus pandemic.

Susan Messina is director of News & Information for University Communications

Kat Lawrence

Chancellor Sharon L. Gaber, left, toured the Cameron Hall lab established for COVID-19 with Rick Tankersley, right, vice chancellor for Research and Economic Development (RED), and Angelica Martins, RED’s interim director.

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Kat Lawrence

Forward Momentum Chancellor Gaber begins planning UNC Charlotte’s future

BY PHILLIP BROWN

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ssuming the chancellorship of UNC Charlotte in the midst of a global pandemic has energized Sharon L. Gaber’s resolve to create a vision for the University that moves it forward.

Among the nation’s most respected university administrators, Gaber, who arrived in mid-July, intends to take the same reasoned approach to guiding UNC Charlotte’s future that she exhibited as the president of the University of Toledo and provost at the University of Arkansas.

To launch her chancellorship, Gaber is devoting much of her first semester to a listening tour (page 22), holding hundreds of virtual and small in-person meetings with campus constituents, particularly students, faculty, staff and alumni, and key stakeholders including city, county and state government leaders; economic development officials; business leaders from a range of industries; and donors and friends of the University.

“Everyone is awaiting the next chapter in this great University’s story,” said Gaber, who was aware of UNC Charlotte’s strong partnerships within the greater Charlotte-Mecklenburg area.

“Everywhere I go, people mention that UNC Charlotte is a

crown jewel, not only for our region but the state. I intend to build upon the passion that Niner Nation members have for their University as well as its well-documented upward trajectory as we become an outstanding national university.”

A determined analytical thinker known for asking the right questions, Gaber uses an academic background in economics and urban planning to her advantage. A California native, she completed a bachelor’s degree from Occidental College, a master’s in urban planning from University of Southern California and a doctorate in city and regional planning from Cornell University.

“I value input, and I want to make decisions that result in the best scenario possible, even though everyone may not be happy,” said Gaber. “I will ask everyone their opinions and try to arrive at a solution that we all feel good about.”

Focusing on students first

Students are fundamental to the existence of all colleges and universities, and they are central to Gaber’s leadership philosophy.

“A student-centered approach acknowledges that they are critically important, and while students may not agree with every course of action we take, they will recognize our commitment to helping them succeed academically and personally,” said Gaber.

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and integrated approach to UNC Charlotte’s efforts to address issues of equity, inclusion and social justice.

“Those we serve, especially because our population consists of a broad range of people, are vital to UNC Charlotte’s future,” Gaber explained. “We want Niner Nation members to stay engaged throughout their lives. Perhaps they will be able to hire other 49ers or offer them internship opportunities. Or they become ardent supporters, attending Charlotte 49er football and basketball games. They also could become donors, financially supporting their alma mater or by advocating on our behalf in their communities. We value that longterm engagement that begins with placing students at the center of all that we do.”

Raising UNC Charlotte’s profile Kat Lawrence

Chancellor Gaber voted in the November 2020 election at UNC Charlotte’s Belk Gym, a Mecklenburg County voting site, which was among the busiest in the county throughout the early voting period and on Election Day.

This has been the case with UNC Charlotte’s back-to-school plan, designed to prioritize the safety of students, faculty and staff during COVID-19.

The fall 2020 semester began virtually on Sept. 7 and transitioned to in-person classes on Oct. 1 with a specific emphasis on those who need access to facilities, equipment or other resources necessary to maintain the best environment for instruction and courses, serving primarily first-year and transfer students to aid in their acclimation to University life.

Another sign of Gaber’s listening approach is the appointment this fall of a special assistant to the chancellor for diversity and inclusion (page 41).

Students, faculty and staff expressed the need for a Cabinet-level position to provide a comprehensive

Darlene Heater Executive Director for University City Partners “Chancellor Gaber will be a great leader not just for UNC Charlotte but for University City and the Charlotte region.

She has an exceptional understanding of urban planning and we look forward to her contributions and thought leadership as we continue to build and grow University City.”

Rep. John A. Fraley 95th District “It was a distinct pleasure to meet Chancellor Gaber on the UNC Charlotte campus in late July. I was immediately convinced she would carry on the great efforts of the University’s previous

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UNC Charlotte is North Carolina’s urban research university, a familiar definer that Gaber acknowledges can be challenging to articulate. As the University approaches its 75th anniversary, Gaber aims to support efforts to clearly define the role of research within UNC Charlotte’s brand. It will likely be a prominent focus of the University’s new strategic plan, due next year.

“We are a research university located in an urban environment, but in actuality, our faculty are conducting research with far-reaching implications and applications, both in terms of rural and metropolitan locations,” said Gaber. “Not to mention, cancer research, energy research and the amazing STEM opportunities afforded students through our School of Data Science and College of Computing and Informatics with its Department of Bioinformatics and Genomics.”

chancellors while expanding and enhancing their work with her vision and resolve. She is a strong listener, thoughtful decision-maker and will be a leader and a strong partner in nurturing the success of UNC Charlotte students and faculty and the future of Charlotte, Mecklenburg County and our great state.”

Vi Lyles Mayor of Charlotte “I have known the past chancellors of UNC Charlotte including Chancellors Dubois, Woodward and Fretwell, and my impression of Dr. Gaber is that she has the same qualities: a great listener, action-

oriented and a commitment to be an integral part of our city. Sharon and I share the sentiment that ‘great cities have great universities,’ and I look forward to working with her to build both; our success depends on it.”

Peter Hans President of the UNC System “Chancellor Gaber and I started our new roles within a few days of each other, so we’re both going through the strangest freshman semester in the University’s history. We’ve bonded through this trying time, and I’m pleased to work together as she takes UNC Charlotte into a new era. I’ll also be excited when we can share a meal instead of just a Zoom screen.”

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Research funding will take on an increased emphasis as Gaber establishes the path to move UNC Charlotte from a Research 2 to a Research 1 institution as determined by the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. While such a move may take time, it will enhance UNC Charlotte’s rising academic reputation, another priority for the chancellor.

“A university’s ranking and reputation speak to the institution’s efforts related to graduation and retention rates, alumni support and faculty quality, frankly, factors that UNC Charlotte currently regards as important,” said Gaber. “To make others aware of UNC Charlotte’s strengths, we’ll need to be intentional in how we communicate these particular points of University pride.”

Continuing to build UNC Charlotte’s research funding will result in attracting greater numbers of graduate students, employing more post-doctorate and faculty researchers, creating a positive multiplier effect for the economic growth of the region.

“We want the greater Charlotte region to recognize that UNC Charlotte is their research university. And we want Charlotte-based businesses and industries and those looking to relocate to the area to know that we are here to respond to their research needs,” said Gaber.

Approaching 75 years

Gaber’s enthusiasm to lead a relatively young institution is contagious, as she looks to capitalize on UNC Charlotte’s past and present to propel its future.

“We have far surpassed where more established universities were at the 75-year mark in their histories,” said Gaber. “The pieces are in place: An outstanding faculty and staff with superb researchers, a diverse and

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Kat Lawrence

academically talented student body, and strong support from the community, businesses and industries that value our role in providing the workforce for today’s knowledge economy. And light rail that strengthens our connection to Uptown.

“A continual influx of entrepreneurs and young people to the Queen City generates a synergy and energy that are palpable. They want to share in our journey and contribute to UNC Charlotte’s positive momentum — and we are eager to work with them to help keep Charlotte growing as well.”

Upon arriving at UNC Charlotte, Chancellor Gaber met with University leaders, including each dean to learn about their vision and goals for their areas.

She met with Anne Cooper Moore, dean, Atkins Library at the University’s iconic library.

Phillip Brown is assistant director of internal communications for University Communications and editor of this publication.

Tahlieah Sampson

Joan Lorden

Krista Manns ’95

Student Body President

Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs

President UNC Charlotte Alumni Association

“Chancellor Gaber’s campus tour gave the deans an opportunity to showcase their colleges’ points of pride and discuss issues that are top of mind. In true pandemic form, faculty popped out of offices, peered over masks or were beamed in by Zoom.

The beauty of the campus and the breadth of programs and facilities were evident. The only thing missing was our students and their energy.”

“When I met Dr. Gaber during her interview process, I was immediately drawn to her sincere desire to become a member of the UNC Charlotte family. Her depth of knowledge about UNC Charlotte, experience and personal approach makes her the right person to lead the institution to the next level. In Dr. Gaber’s short time on campus, she has conducted listening tours, engaged alumni and immersed herself in becoming a 49er. I’m excited about the next era of our great university.”

“We can all agree that this year is unlike any other. Despite these unprecedented difficulties, Chancellor Gaber has done a great job interacting with the student body.

The two of us communicate often to discuss student wants and needs, plans for the University and the overall well-being of UNC Charlotte.

Chancellor Gaber genuinely puts the students first and is doing all she can to address our concerns during a difficult time. The Student Government Association and I appreciate the transparency she provides and look forward to the work we will do together this year.”

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Chancellor Gaber’s research experience in urban planning will be a benefit as she meets with campus stakeholders to plan for UNC Charlotte’s future.

Solution-focused Urban planning leads Sharon Gaber to NC’s urban research university

BY PHILLIP BROWN

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college campus is much like a city,” explained Chancellor Sharon L Gaber. “There are concerns with housing, transportation, parking, safety and security, and other essential services, and you are working to meet the needs of the people in your city or in my case, the needs of my campus.”

Drawing these comparisons comes naturally to Gaber, an urban planner, whose credentials and expertise provide a springboard for steering UNC Charlotte through continued excellence and toward new heights.

Gaber traces her interest in urban planning, in part, to a childhood memory related to the

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construction of the 210 Freeway in Pasadena, California, her hometown. Similar to other projects across the country at that time, the new highway resulted in the demolition of 1,000-plus homes and historic buildings, displacing families and destroying established small businesses. “Even at the age of 8, I knew there was something very wrong with that,” she said.

It was an urban economics course a decade later at Occidental College that lit a fire, prompting interest in a series of planning-related courses. Shifting from the business career that was her initial consideration, Gaber went to work for the city of Long Beach, California,

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“UNC CHARLOTTE, WHEN YOU ACCOUNT FOR THE NUMBER OF STUDENTS, FACULTY AND STAFF, IS THE EQUIVALENT OF A GOODSIZED COMPANY THAT CAN HAVE A MAJOR IMPACT ON ITS REGION.” —CH A N C E L LO R S H ARO N L . GAB E R

as an undergraduate, gaining experience in both planning and economic development.

She continued to work there after enrolling in the Master of Urban Planning program at the University of Southern California.

“I loved my work in Long Beach,” said Gaber.

“It’s where I discovered my passion for uncovering answers to problems and developing solutions to address community needs. When I informed the planning director of my decision to pursue a Ph.D. in city and regional planning at Cornell, he said, ‘That’s a real waste.’ And from his perspective, it may have been. But for me, it was the best decision of my life.”

As a doctoral student, Gaber became entrenched in the study of serious questions that affected people, and delighted in researching ways to resolve them.

With a new doctorate, Gaber accepted a faculty position at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. There she and colleagues investigated the influx of refugees into the Great Plains states, where the majority of resettled international refugees relocated during the latter part of the 20th century. The study touched on a number of her research interests, including community needs assessment, transportation, NIMBY (not in my back yard) and homelessness.

This experience led Gaber to Auburn University, where she was associate dean and professor in the College of Architecture, Design and Construction. The transition to administration continued as she was named Auburn’s associate provost for academic administration, then senior provost and interim provost, before she served as provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at the University of Arkansas, where she also held a faculty appointment as professor of sociology in the J. William Fulbright

Wade Bruton

College of Arts and Sciences. Prior to joining UNC Charlotte, Gaber was president of the University of Toledo. Numerous published articles throughout her career on regional and urban planning, public policy and community decision-making, and a book that she coauthored on planning research methods, populate Gaber’s curriculum vitae.

She regards her background as a strength for leading UNC Charlotte and a voice for championing the University’s impact on the Charlotte region.

“UNC Charlotte, when you account for the number of students, faculty and staff, is the equivalent of a good-sized company that can have a major impact on its region,” Gaber said.

“We’d like the Charlotte community to consider ways to strengthen its reciprocal relationship with the University, similar to those in Silicon Valley or Research Triangle Park. A relationship where everyone works together so the broader community continues to flourish.”

Early this fall, Chancellor Gaber held a press conference at Hauser Alumni Pavilion, where the media were able to participate according to social distancing guidelines. She shared the University’s plans for opening the campus safely, which included distribution of Welcome Back to Campus kits for each student and employee that contained face coverings, hand sanitizer, a thermometer and other helpful information and resources.

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Green and Gold Drive Business The Belk College of Business celebrates 50 years of growth by recognizing the alumni, students and faculty who are driving business in Charlotte and beyond.

BY J AY D AV I S

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ifty years ago, UNC Charlotte’s Board of Trustees, recognizing explosive growth at the University and responding to highereducation trends, established the College of Business Administration.

The new college, with Allan V. Palmer as its founding dean, had just eight full-time faculty members. Today, the Belk College of Business is one of the largest, most diverse business schools in the Carolinas, with nearly 100 full-time faculty and

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4,703 graduate and undergraduate students.

“The Belk College’s growth and tremendous success did not come by chance,” said Jennifer Troyer, who was appointed the college’s seventh dean in July after serving in leadership roles at the college and at UNC Charlotte for over 20 years.

“We are indebted to those visionary college and community leaders, our dedicated faculty and staff, and our students and alumni. That vision and dedication transformed the Belk College, from its

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humble beginnings, into a leading urban research business school.”

More than half of the college’s more than 33,000 alumni live and work in Charlotte.

“From Fortune 500 companies to small startups, Business Niners are the forefront throughout Charlotte,” said David Maddox ’04, a manager at Duke Energy and chair of the industry engagement committee for the Belk College Alumni Council. “We’re driving business.

The college’s deep connections to Charlotte are immeasurable, creating countless career opportunities for students and alumni.”

Troyer said the college has been fortunate to have the support of alumni and strong connections to the business community to help meet the tremendous workforce needs in one of the country’s fastest growing regions.

Through its Board of Advisors, Alumni Council and department, program, center and school advisory boards, the college is aligned with more than 120 Charlotte business partners.

“Belk College faculty bring the business community together, gathering input to make sure there is an alignment,” said Malcomb Coley, EY U.S. Central Growth Market Leader and Charlotte managing partner. “This ensures that the workforce that they’re developing is consistent with what we need. Charlotte is one of EY’s fastest-growing regions, and our collaboration with Belk College faculty has been crucial to supporting this growth.

We’ve partnered to grow together, especially offering innovative solutions in growth areas such as digital analytics.”

In 2015, Charlotte-based Childress Klein invested $2.5 million to support professorships and fellowships to support the Master of Science in Real Estate program. The support from Fred Klein and Don Childress laid the foundation for additional contributions from donors to support initiatives under the Childress Klein Center for Real Estate, including research in affordable housing in Charlotte and a new undergraduate concentration in real estate.

“UNC Charlotte’s Belk College of Business is an incredibly important resource for our area,” said Klein, senior managing partner at Childress Klein and a UNC Charlotte trustee. “It’s important not only as a source of talent to our existing employers, but serves as a resource for attracting and retaining new business for our region.”

50th Anniversary Events

The yearlong celebration is themed “Green and Gold Drive Business.”

“This big milestone is an opportunity for us to not only look back at our accomplishments but also to reintroduce the college to our region,” Troyer said. “The Belk College is on the move, driving business through our research, our alumni and our connection to the Charlotte region.”

The college is celebrating a number of milestones in 2020-21, including: • T he MBA program’s 50th anniversary.

• T he Master of Science in Economics’ 30th anniversary.

• T he 30th anniversary of the naming of the Belk College.

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The Belk College is among fewer than 2% of the world’s business schools to achieve and maintain AACSB International accreditation for both business and accounting programs.

50 YEARS OF DRIVING BUSINESS: 1970-2020 1960s The University of North Carolina at Charlotte has offered undergraduate programs in business administration since the 1960s. In 1968, the Division of Economics and Business Administration was formed, and in 1970, the College of Business Administration was established with departments of Accounting, Business Administration and Economics.

The college added its first graduate program, a Master of Management degree (later Master of Business Administration) in 1970.

1970s Nov. 13, 1970 UNC Charlotte creates the College of Business Administration with the departments of Accounting, Business Administration and Economics. Allan V. Palmer is appointed dean.

The college has eight fulltime faculty members.

UNC Charlotte begins offering the first graduate program for business professionals in the Charlotte region, the Master of Management (later Master of Business Administration).

Dean Allan Palmer

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Share in the 50th Celebration Belk College of Business alumni are encouraged to share their memories as part of the college’s 50th anniversary celebration. Did a faculty or staff member or student inspire you? Share your memories and photos using #BelkCollege50 or submit them online at belkcollege.uncc.edu/50.

Ryan Honeyman

Belk College of Business Dean Jennifer Troyer talks about professional opportunities for undergraduate students.

With social distancing, the college’s anniversary will be celebrated with online events and virtual celebrations.

In September, the college launched the Dean’s Leadership Series, a monthly online series that brings together a panel of experts who will shed light on pressing topics facing business leaders. Topics this fall focused on diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace, and the pandemic’s impact on commercial real estate and family business.

The college also recently debuted Charlotte Business Buzz, a podcast series that offers one-onone interviews with faculty, alumni and business

1970s

Growing with Charlotte

Over the past 10 years, Belk College enrollment has increased by more than 30%. The growth continued this fall, with the college seeing record graduate enrollment and the largest and most diverse freshman classes in its history, at 607 students.

To serve the growing needs of the Charlotte region, the college continues to expand its portfolio of graduate and executive education programs.

Since 2015, the college has added two distinctive

1980s 1981 The North Carolina Economic Forecast launches with John Connaughton as director.

1978 Richard Neel is appointed dean, a position he will hold until 1993.

John Connaughton

Dean Richard Neel

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partners. A second season of the podcast debuted in October.

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1982 The Friday Building, named for UNC System President William Friday and his wife, Ida, is dedicated as the Belk College’s home.

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graduate programs: the first and only AACSBaccredited Doctorate in Business Administration (DBA) program in the Carolinas and the only Master of Science in Management program in the UNC System.

The college also partnered with the College of Computing and Informatics to launch the Master of Data Science and Business Analytics (DSBA) program. Belk College also is an interdisciplinary partner in the School of Data Science.

Over the past decade, the Belk College has expanded its reach globally, developing partnerships with 10 universities in eight countries.

For undergraduate students, a $2.5 million gift in 2015 from Belk College alumnus Robert Niblock, retired CEO and chairman of Lowe’s Companies, has created a one-stop support hub for students.

“The Niblock Student Center has created comprehensive and transformative support for Belk College undergraduate students,” said Pat Mynatt, associate dean for undergraduate programs.

During the 2019-20 academic year, more than 2,800 students attended professional development programs and over 6,000 meetings between students were conducted through the Niblock Student Center. Mynatt said the support students receive shows in recent outcome data.

Among 2019 graduates, 90% were employed full time or enrolled in continuing education after graduation.

North Carolina’s Urban Research Business School

More than ever, Belk College researchers are stepping up to find solutions to issues impacting

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Catch the Charlotte Business Buzz Charlotte Business Buzz is available online at belkcollege.uncc.edu/buzz. This podcast series connects Charlotte’s business leaders to UNC Charlotte faculty, staff, students, alumni and industry partners through one-on-one interviews hosted by Jeffrey Jones, director of Executive Education and Professional Development in the Belk College of Business.

Here’s a lineup of topics available at Charlotte Business Buzz:

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eadership Amidst Tumultuous Times with guest Janaki Gooty, associate L professor of Management

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areer Searching in the AI Age featuring Patrick Madsen, director of the C University Career Center

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amily Business Amidst COVID-19 with Associate Professor of Management F Torsten Pieper

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riving Business in University City, featuring Darlene Heater, executive D director, University City Partners

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levating Queen City Entrepreneurs with alumnus Bryan Delaney ’03, E Skookum co-founder

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conomic Impact of COVID-19 with John Connaughton, director of the E Barings/UNC Charlotte Economic Forecast

the community and the world.

In 2019, the college’s Childress Klein Center for Real Estate launched the State of Housing in Charlotte Report, a comprehensive, data-driven analysis of the current state of the housing markets in the Charlotte region and an overview of the recent trends. An updated report, which focused on the impact of COVID-19 on housing in Charlotte, was released in October.

1990s 1984 The college becomes the first business school in the region to receive accreditation from AACSB International, the leading accrediting agency for business and accounting programs.

1990 The first business advisory council is established, with Thomas M. Belk, longtime president and chief merchandising officer of Belk stores, as chair.

The college is renamed the Belk College of Business Administration in honor of the William Henry Belk family and the Belk organization.

The Master in Science in Economics launches.

1995 The Belk College becomes the first college or university to provide business courses in Uptown Charlotte with the opening of the Cityfair Center campus.

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Belk College Global Partners

1

1

Copenhagen Business Schoo

Copenhagen, Denmark

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EGADE Business School, Tecnológico de Monterrey

Monterrey, Mexico

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Kingston University

London, United Kingdom

3

8

4

Lyon Trois University

Lyon, France

4

10

5

Shanghai University of Finance and Economics

Shanghai, China

6

University of Cantabria

Cantabria, Spain

7

Universitá Cattolica del Sacro Cuore

Milan, Italy

8

University of Duisburg-Essen

Duisburg, Germany

9

University of Hong Kong

Hong Kong

6

7

5

2

9

10 University of Mannheim

In April, the report was recognized by AACSB International through its 2020 Innovations That Inspire Challenge, one of only 25 business schools worldwide to receive recognition.

Earlier this year, as the nation faced the COVID-19 pandemic, Belk College researchers continued their focus on topics of global importance, including family businesses and the pandemic, running successful virtual meetings and using analytics to identify misinformation on social media.

“Due to COVID-19, the workforce is grappling with multiple existential threats, all unfolding rapidly and simultaneously: loss of life, financial losses, job loss and insecurity, mental health challenges, disruptions to work-family-life,” said Janaki Gooty, an associate professor of management who is part of a team of Belk College researchers studying leadership and the pandemic. “Our research is investigating the specific actions that leaders across industries have enacted to mitigate the effects on their stakeholders while they explore new futures.”

1990s To accommodate growth at the college, a third floor is constructed to the Friday Building along with distinctive columns.

The project is funded through $3 million from a state bond referendum approved by voters in 1993.

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During the 2019-20 academic year, Belk College faculty were published in 130 peer-reviewed publications and received more than $1 million in outside research funding.

The Next 50 Years

With a strong group of faculty researchers, growing partnerships and a growing alumni network, the college’s future is bright, Troyer said.

“For five decades, the Belk College has always been a leader in Charlotte,” Troyer said. “We have worked to offer programs that provide a talent pipeline with a firm understanding of the needs of Charlotte and other urban areas. “Looking ahead, we’re on a strong trajectory. We’re poised to become one of the top urban research business schools in the country and while continuing to be a driving force for economic development for our region.”

Jay Davis is executive director, External Relations, for the Belk College of Business.

2000s 2005 The Center for Real Estate launches as the Belk College celebrates its 35th anniversary.

The college officially shortens its name to the Belk College of Business.

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Mannheim, Germany

2010s 2006 The Belk College launches its first doctoral program, Ph.D. in Business Administration.

A Dual MBA program with Global Business certificate begins with partner Graduate School of Business Administration and Leadership (EGADE) at Tecnológico de Monterrey in Mexico.

2011 Steven Ott, who first joined the Belk College in 1999, is appointed dean.

UNC Charlotte Center City (now The Dubois Center at UNC Charlotte Center City) opens.

The building houses all Belk College graduate and Executive Education programs.

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Forging Leaders

UNC Charlotte’s MBA turns 50

BY J AY D AV I S

In August 1970, UNC Charlotte launched the first graduate program in the region for working business professionals. Today, the Belk College’s nationally ranked part-time MBA has more than 4,200 alumni.

M

anuel Zapata ’69, ’72 still remembers his first class in UNC Charlotte’s MBA program 50 years ago.

“The professor said, ‘Welcome to the MBA program. We are going to practice with you,’” said Zapata, who had immigrated from Chile three years earlier.

Verl Purdy ’73 traveled from West Virginia to pursue his dream of becoming the first in his family to receive an advanced degree.

“We were a group of students about the same age,” Purdy said. “So we were in a program where we were always together.

It was a great time for us, and the faculty was the same way. Faculty had never taught graduate students before. This was a whole unique experience for that, and even the

dean of the business school taught some of the classes. So for us, it was a mutually exciting time.”

The MBA program, celebrating its 50th anniversary this academic year, debuted as the

Verl Purdy

Manuel Zapata

first graduate program for working business professionals in the Charlotte region in August 1970, just a year after UNC Charlotte launched its first master’s program.

Zapata and Purdy were among several dozen business professionals chosen from hundreds of applicants for the new program, which launched as the Master of Management. All the students selected were working full time and had at least five years of work experience.

Allan V. Palmer, a retired Navy lieutenant commander who became the Belk College’s founding dean in November 1970, created the unique parttime program at the urging of Charlotte

2013 The Belk family continues its support of the college by donating $5 million, the largest gift in college’s history. The donation creates a Belk Scholars Program for undergraduate students and also supports faculty research and teaching.

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2014 The Master of Science in Data Sciences and Analytics, a collaboration between the Belk College and the College of Computing and Informatics, launches.

Belk College alumnus Kyle White ‘13 receives the Medal of Honor in a White House ceremony for this service in Iraq and Afghanistan.

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No. 1 part-time MBA among public universities in North Carolina - U.S. News & World Report

No. 1 North Carolina MBA for value

Fall 2019 MBA students gathered in uptown Charlotte to celebrate the start of their graduate studies; the Belk College’s oldest graduate program, the MBA continues to serve the Charlotte region.

business leaders who were looking to grow executive-level talent in the city.

A who’s who of Charlotte business luminaries were instrumental in the establishment and growth of the program. This includes Tom Storrs and Hugh McColl with North Carolina National Bank; Ed Crutchfield and Frank Dunn with First Union National Bank; Harold Hoak with Wachovia Bank and Trust; and William Grigg with Duke Power.

Zapata said most of his classes had fewer than 10 students.

“To bring experience, you had to contribute,” he said. “You learn pretty soon that management is an applied science. That’s why they wanted us to bring our work experience.”

- U.S. Departments of Education and Treasury

A lot has changed in Charlotte since the program first launched, but a constant over the years has been the focus on working professionals.

“Our program has a 50-year history of engaging working professionals as they bring their industry knowledge into the academic environment,” said Gary Kohut, director of the MBA program and professor of management. “Having a strong balance between rigorous theories and practical experiences, our graduates are able to create significant value in their organizations.”

The Belk College’s oldest and largest graduate program, the MBA has continued to grow to serve the Charlotte region and beyond. In August, enrollment in the program increased by 37% over 2019 to 455.

2010s 2015 Belk College alumnus Robert Niblock, CEO of Lowe’s Companies Inc., donates $2.5 million to support the student center and professional development at the college. The gift creates the Niblock Student Center, a one-stop source for students based at the Friday Building.

The Center for Real Estate is renamed in recognition of a $2.5 million gift from real estate company Childress Klein.

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2016 Professor Emeritus Thomas C. Turner, who helped establish the Department of Accounting, donates $2.5 million to UNC Charlotte, and the department becomes the Turner School of Accountancy in his honor.

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Strengths: Agility and Support Recognizing the extraordinary challenges facing applicants during the COVID-19 pandemic, this spring, the Belk College MBA became one of the first programs in the country to temporarily waive the GMAT/GRE test requirements for qualified applicants. The waiver eligibility has been extended for students applying for a spring 2021 start.

The program offers multiple concentrations to meet student and employer demands head-on and ranks as the no. 1 part-time MBA among public universities in North Carolina, according to U.S. News & World Report. The program also is the no. 1 North Carolina MBA for value, according to U.S. Department of Education and Department of Treasury data.

Over 50 years, the MBA program has more than 4,200 alumni, with more than half of them living and working in the Charlotte region.

“For five decades, our alumni have consistently personified the value of the Belk College MBA by achieving professional and personal goals, no matter a student’s career stage,” Kohut said. “When I think of all our MBA graduates who are now impacting our city and economy, it’s impressive that Charlotte really is built on their contributions.”

Finding success

Jeanette Kuda ’14, was new to Charlotte and looking to form a network of business

professionals. She said she found that with the Belk College MBA. “Since I graduated six years ago, I have been promoted and then took a new role that I love with a fabulous firm,” Kuda said.

“I don’t think any of that would have been possible without the Belk College MBA program. I also have been fortunate to build a strong network with other alumni and even work with several of them now.”

Decades after earning an MBA from UNC Charlotte, Zapata started his own engineering business. He said his MBA was even more beneficial as a business owner.

“The MBA will teach you to write,” Zapata said. “I also learned to think differently.

That’s the best contribution of the MBA for me. It helps you understand business.”

The Belk College MBA launched Purdy on a career path that included leadership roles at B.F. Goodrich Chemicals, BASF and Rio Tinto Zinc Chemicals before founding AGDATA, which became the largest agricultural data analysis and marketing company in the world.

In November, Purdy received the Belk College Distinguished Alumni Award, the college’s highest honor.

“I got my MBA, I left Charlotte, and I started the most interesting international career you could ever imagine,” Purdy said. “I learned a lot about international business, and the things I learned in my MBA program are the things that guided me.”

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About the Belk College MBA Established: August 1970 as the Master of Management, became the Master of Business Administration (MBA) in 1977.

Enrollment (fall 2020): 455 Alumni: 4,224

MBA Facts 1970: First graduate program for business professionals in the Charlotte region.

1995: First MBA to offer courses in uptown Charlotte.

Since 2006, the Belk College has offered a dual MBA program through a partnership with the Graduate School of Business Administration and Leadership (EGADE) at Tecnológico de Monterrey in Mexico.

2020 2016 U.S. News & World Report researchers find that UNC Charlotte is one of only eight U.S. universities to have multiple alumni who serve as CEOs of Fortune 100 companies – Robert Niblock ‘85, former CEO of Lowe’s Companies, and Joseph Swedish ‘72, CEO of Anthem.

2017 The Doctorate in Business Administration (DBA) program launches as the only AACSB-accredited program of its kind in the Carolinas.

Madison Hartness

2020 Jennifer Troyer is named the Belk College’s seventh dean; the college celebrates its 50th anniversary.

2018 Madison Hartness becomes the Belk College’s 30,000th graduate.

2019 The inaugural cohort for the M.S. Management, the first program of its kind in the UNC System, forms.

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Seeking Balance UNC Charlotte pushes for racial equity in schools

BY WILLS CITTY

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he killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police in May 2020 and the deaths of other unarmed Black people at the hands of law enforcement in the following months put on display truths about inequality and racism in America.

One place the energy generated in response has flowed is the educational system, where the imprint of race is as old as America’s first one-room schoolhouses. Addressing this lineage and creating equity for all students has become the lifelong work of thousands of educators, researchers, individuals and organizations. It’s in the mission of the Cato College of Education “to be a national leader in educational excellence through equity

Illustration by Myron Macklin

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and engagement.” Confronting issues of equality has long been an important part of the work for the faculty, staff and students of the college.

Now, with collaborators locally and across the country, UNC Charlotte’s educational leaders are redoubling efforts to make schools equitable environments for all students.

building. We had quite a few write-ups from our hallways for discipline because Black students were approached more often and getting into the back and forths with teachers. Those numbers fell when we improved our practices,” Benson said.

Understanding racial bias in schools

Such experiences are far from unique.

Research overwhelmingly shows racial disproportionality in discipline in American public schools. A 2014 study by the U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights found Black students are suspended and expelled at three times greater rates than white

UNC Charlotte educational leadership professor Tracey Benson has been busy. The book he co-authored, “Unconscious Bias in Schools: A Developmental Approach to Exploring Race and Racism,” was released in August 2019 and was well-received by the educational community, then burst onto the larger scene in the wake of the national dialogue on race and inequality.

Benson consults with districts and schools on racial equity and is now a regular guest on news outlets across the country, while continuing to teach graduate-level classes. Like many of his colleagues at the Cato College of Education, his work in higher education is grounded in and fueled by personal experience in K-12 schools.

As a high school principal in Massachusetts, Benson recalls a moment when a student helped him address his own bias. He was monitoring the hallway between classes and asked a group of students to move along, only to find one of those students waiting at his office later in the day.

“Mr. Benson, why is it that you and all the other teachers are always picking on the Black kids in the hallway? Whenever we stand in the hallways, you come and move us, but you don’t move the white kids,” the student explained.

Benson, who hadn’t been aware of this, set out to observe class transitions for the next week and closely consider his own tendencies.

“Oh, goodness gracious, this is happening!” he remembers saying after witnessing teachers policing groups of Black students far more than their peers and even walking past groups of white students standing in the hallway on the way to do so. A meeting with his leadership team and concerted efforts to “correct the behavior, not the student” helped resolve the issue.

“Enforcing the rule, rather than targeting persons, really improved the racial climate of our

By the numbers

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“Most adults are functionally racially illiterate, meaning that we have not developed the skill, ability or depth of knowledge to talk about the concept of racism.”

TRACEY BENSON, EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP PROFESSOR

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“We must acknowledge and address white supremacy and systemic racism using racial equity tools.”

SU SAN MCCART ER, UN C CH A R LOT T E SOC IAL WO R K PROFESSOR

students, and though they comprise 16 percent of the total enrollment, Black students make up nearly one-third of all suspensions. That data becomes even starker when overlaid on a study by the Council of State Governments Justice Center that tracked 6,000 middle school students.

Researchers there found 97 percent of suspensions were at the discretion of administrators, while only three percent were mandated by policy based on the offense, and Black students were 31 percent more likely to receive a discretionary suspension.

“The data reveal significant disproportionality by race and ethnicity for K-12 students identified

as gifted/talented and those who receive suspensions — yet white children are not smarter than children of color and children of color do not misbehave at rates anywhere near what we’re seeing. We must acknowledge and address white supremacy and systemic racism using racial equity tools,” said Susan McCarter, a UNC Charlotte social work professor and former probation officer who studies disproportionalities in the juvenile justice system.

Education professor Bettie Rae Butler, whose research also focuses on the school-to-prison pipeline, added that when students are taken

Kat Lawrence

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out of schools through exclusionary discipline practices such as out-of-school suspensions and expulsions they miss vital instructional time. Once a student falls behind in their coursework, they are then at a greater risk of dropping out of school, and facing job uncertainties and higher risks of incarceration.

Inequities also are present in data on classroom dynamics and in-school realities that reflect on student achievement.

“It can affect Black students’ self-esteem, their ability to learn, their stress levels, it’s acting on them every day,” Benson said. Indeed, a national study published in the Journal of Educational Research found that counties with higher aggregate levels of educator bias tend to have larger white/Black test score inequalities and suspension disparities.

Overcoming obstacles

Two of the primary barriers to addressing unconscious biases — those sets of learned beliefs about a specific race of people that can cause an individual to prefer or discriminate against a race — are interrelated.

“The first reason is that most adults are functionally racially illiterate, meaning that we have not developed the skill, ability or depth of knowledge to talk about the concept of racism,” Benson explains. These limitations in knowledge can help drive trepidation, particularly among white teachers, about engaging discussions about race in schools.

“It’s so uncomfortable to say ‘in this school building, we are acting on a racial bias.’ It’s going to be uncomfortable. And we’re going to have to have a lot of discussions and sustain this discomfort to actually surface how it exists, then actually address it,” he added.

Erin Miller, an associate professor in the UNC Charlotte Department of Reading and Elementary Education whose research includes a focus on anti-racism, also pointed out the need to disrupt existing narratives.

“We should prioritize correcting the misconception that talking about race and racism exacerbates racism. Racial literacy is essential to develop if we are to fully understand the democratic ideals of our country, and racial literacy cannot be developed by shutting down conversations because we are afraid of them,” she said.

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Moving through what Benson calls a “ripening period” is the starting point in enabling educational systems to look at classroom observation, achievement and discipline data and other sources for gaps between white students and students of color. The emphasis for Benson and other leaders in the field is to approach addressing unconscious bias in schools as a continuum of personal racial identity development, rather than a process of assigning labels of racist versus non-racist.

“We’ve all absorbed some racial bias,” said Benson. “We have to jettison that dichotomy from our mind. There are just folks who are really early onto the racial identity development. So we cannot cordon them off and say, you’re irredeemable. They just have a lot of learning to do.”

For Benson and his co-author, awareness, trust and a “learner’s stance” are the building blocks of more equitable schools.

Looking in the mirror

While developing the national understanding of school equity through research and contributing to the local community through activism and professional development is important, leaders in the Cato College of Education also emphasize collective internal efforts as key to progress.

“Many times, faculty whose research and teaching focuses on anti-racism are called on to participate in other work on this important subject. And it can be exhausting and time consuming to be involved in multiple projects with multiple groups. For that reason and because we all need to grow on the subject, it’s imperative we all take a role in moving forward,” said Teresa Petty, interim dean of the Cato College of Education

Curricular focus

With surveys indicating that nationally, many new teachers struggle with issues of diversity and culture, UNC Charlotte is both examining curriculum and developing new programs to help graduates navigate these complex topics. Currently, there are multiple efforts underway to infuse content on equity across the Cato College of Education class offerings.

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“Racial literacy is essential to develop if we are to fully understand the democratic ideals of our country.”

ERIN MILLER, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, READING AND ELEMENTARY EDUCATION

Through the newly created Strengthening Our Core committee, a group of faculty members are sharing resources on anti-racism and outlining plans to integrate it into the general teacher education curricula. Simultaneously, the college’s diversity committee is further developing a basis for these updates through its Diversity Realignment Workshop, which produced recommendations to submit to interim dean Petty. Integrating this type of instruction across the curriculum is important for faculty because understanding race is a developmental process.

“One diversity class is not a silver bullet,” said professor Tehia Starker-Glass. “It really does have to be a progression of learning, of critical thinking, of being exposed, of being challenged.

Then hopefully by student teaching they’ve learned content from freshman to senior year.”

The college’s equity-focused program offerings are also a strength. Created in 2014, the Anti-Racism in Urban Education Graduate Certificate has grown in popularity each year since. “We knew the rich traditions of antiracism in our country were not a part of college curricula in a consistent way. We acknowledge how K-12 schools have undereducated and miseducated students, and we wanted to provide an opportunity for our students to learn historically accurate information about race, racism and anti-racism,” said Starker-Glass, who co-designed the program with Miller.

The graduate certificate feeds into the online master’s program in urban education, allowing students the opportunity to develop their knowledge further. That program is the only one of its kind in the country. For those seeking a broader knowledge base in the area, faculty also worked with UNC Charlotte Distance Education to create the a graduate certificate program in Culturally Sustaining Instruction — offering a convenient online option for working teachers.

Cato College also is turning inward to further the dialogue and strengthen its own practices in diversity. Its recently released statement on anti-racism was written collaboratively by faculty and staff, and focuses on concrete action, including earmarking funds 38 UNC CHARLOTTE magazine

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for equity programming, examining curricula, faculty hiring and student recruitment practices through an anti-racist lens.

Profound Niners

To further its goals of recruiting a diverse student population, the college formed a partnership with Profound Gentlemen, a nonprofit organization that works to support and retain male teachers of color. The collaboration, called Profound Niners, was originally established to create an innovative pipeline for male students of color interested in exploring the possibility of pursuing a career in education. The Profound Niners internship will be made available to male seniors of color in fall 2021. This year-long program will provide the opportunity for selected participants to serve in a classroom alongside a mentor in hopes of encouraging them to consider a career in education. The importance of programs like Profound Niners is supported by the backdrop of a national teaching population that is nearly 80% white and not reflective of the diversity of America’s schools and by research showing that students perform better when they have exposure to teachers that share their racial identity.

Racial bias in school is a complex and challenging issue that asks for a multi-layered, cooperative response. Through its programs, approaches — and most importantly — people, the Cato College of Education is pushing forward toward a future where every student receives an equal opportunity in America’s schools.

“While I know we have work to do, I know it’s work we’re capable of doing,” Petty said.

“There is real energy out there for dealing with racism and inequity, and this college and University have the resources to help channel it in a way that produces results, rather than talk alone. When those results are an educational experience that allows all students to thrive, it’s an effort we are proud to commit ourselves to.”

Wills Citty is director of communications for the Cato College of Education and College of Health and Human Services.

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Community Connections

UNC Charlotte’s inextricable link to its home city includes close connections with its surrounding school districts. Building on longstanding relationships and a commitment to the mutual exchange of ideas, the Cato College of Education and its partners are taking steps to continue to promote equity in the region’s schools.

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arnessing the recent energy for work in antiracism has been made more challenging by COVID-19, but education faculty like Tehia Starker-Glass have responded with creativity. StarkerGlass, who serves as the director of diversity and inclusion at the Cato College of Education, recently collaborated with leaders from the Rowan-Salisbury, Mooresville and Kannapolis school districts to host a virtual summit focusing on school equity. The weeklong event covered topics such as empowering students to voice views on diversity, nurturing student potential and creating culturally responsive literacy in the classroom.

Dozens of attendees engaged with speakers from across

the districts and five featured talks from UNC Charlotte faculty and staff.

“Through this partnership, we are able to provide ongoing, high-quality opportunities for educator growth and development that empower our teachers to be more responsive and move toward more equitable student outcomes. I can truly say [the summit] has been transformative for our teachers who have participated,” said Jessica Grant, director of Student Services and Secondary Education at Kannapolis City Schools.

The virtual summit is a continuation of communityfocused work by faculty. On page 40, read about additional initiatives that support these efforts.

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UNC Charlotte is dedicating itself to providing teachers in the region the tools to create classrooms where all students can thrive. And these group approaches are just a small portion of overall efforts by faculty and staff, who provide guidance on an individual basis to groups across the country.

Race Matters for Juvenile Justice (RMJJ)

Community Equity Committee

Susan McCarter, a social work researcher and former probation officer, helps lead a group of judicial officers, experts, service providers and community partners working together to reduce the disproportionate representation of and outcomes for children and families of color in the juvenile justice system. Its twoday intensive racial equity workshop is designed to build the capacity of community leaders, including educators, to understand and eliminate racial inequities.

• “ The facilitators taught us in two days what took me two years to learn in grad school. It was so beautifully presented and constructed to all come together in a very clear way. I wish this workshop was required for everyone alive.” - Participant

When the CharlotteMecklenburg Board of Education created its Community Equity Committee, it selected Professors Bettie Rae Butler and Chance Lewis, the Carol Grotnes Belk Distinguished Professor of Urban Education, from a list of more than 350 volunteers. The pair will work with the 40-person committee to review and discuss CMS data and programs in order to monitor progress toward equity.

Teacher Education Institute (TEI) Supported by a grant from the Belk Foundation, the Cato College of Education’s Teacher Education Institute (TEI) brings together faculty who teach courses, on-campus student teaching supervisors, and the K-12 clinical educators who take student teachers into their schools to set benchmarks and develop advanced coaching skills to support teacher candidates. During a multi-day summer session and follow-ups throughout the year, TEI has emphasized equitable practices and coaching teacher candidates through an equity lens.

• “ I love the intentionality the Cato College of Education is establishing. TEI provided me with the opportunity and perspective to personally reflect and identify my own privileges, and by identifying my privilege I am better able to see and meet the needs of more of my students.”

- Daniel Maxwell, social studies teacher at Central Cabarrus High School

Charlotte Teachers Institute (CTI) In collaboration with Johnson C. Smith University and Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools (CMS), UNC Charlotte faculty are leading seminars where teachers learn content and work together to develop new curricula for their students through the Charlotte Teachers Institute (CTI). Faculty member Erin Miller is teaching a CTI course on anti-racist teaching methods and working with 12 CMS teachers.

• “ Watching them take theoretical assertions about anti-racism from readings, films and conversations and deploy those in pedagogical ways that make sense for their students, their content areas, and their professional settings is incredibly inspiring.”

- Erin Miller, associate professor of Reading and Elementary Education

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The Urban Education Collaborative Chance Lewis leads a UNC Charlotte group formed in fall 2011 to serve as a research and outreach hub focused on improving urban schools in the state of North Carolina and the nation, and one of the few groups of its kind.

The Collaborative’s biennial International Conference on Urban Education welcomes hundreds of attendees from every state in the United States and participants across the world to facilitate solutions-based discussions on the topic.

• “What we look at are the structural impediments that keep students and people in urban communities from reaching their full potential. What keeps schools from not being on the same level playing field? And we deal with those types of issues and anti-racism from the structural all the way down to individual acts. Charlotte’s educational history coupled with recent growth and a strong culture of innovation makes it an ideal location for groups like the Urban Education Collaborative to conduct research and programming.”

- Chance Lewis, Carol Grotnes Belk Distinguished Professor of Urban Education

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New scholarship to support students engaged in social action

Cheryl Waites Spellman

Kat Lawrence

UNC Charlotte appoints diversity and inclusion leader Chancellor Sharon L. Gaber recently appointed Social Work Professor Cheryl Waites Spellman interim special assistant to the chancellor for diversity and inclusion. A proven leader in higher education administration and leading expert in social work policy and research, Waites Spellman will coordinate with staff, faculty and students to build on the University’s diversity and inclusion efforts toward creating an accessible, inclusive and equitable climate. She is working with leaders to develop and align strategic goals across the University while remaining a professor in UNC Charlotte’s School of Social Work as a national search for a permanent leader begins in spring 2021.

“UNC Charlotte’s dedication to academic excellence is inseparable from our commitment to advancing diversity, equity and inclusion to ensure all students, faculty and staff feel welcome, valued and able to reach their full potential,

and is aligned with the UNC System’s strategic goals to make access, equity, student success, and excellent and diverse institutions a top priority,” said Gaber in appointing Waites Spellman.

“We are proud of the work already being done to build an equitable, accessible and inclusive campus community, but we know there’s more to do, and I’m confident that Dr. Waites Spellman’s years of outstanding leadership in higher education and her extensive experience in leading collaborative and strategic programmatic and organizational initiatives will enable her to provide the necessary leadership to oversee this important work.”

Waites Spellman joined the School of Social Work in 2018 from Wayne State University, where she was dean and professor of its School of Social Work. She also served as a tenured associate professor at N.C. State University.

The newly created UNC Charlotte Alumni Association Scholarship for Social Justice provides annual support to returning undergraduate students with demonstrated financial need, potential for academic success in their chosen program of study and a record of service or social action either at UNC Charlotte, in the greater Charlotte community or in their hometown.

Sallie Sistare, executive director, Alumni Affairs, said, “This scholarship provides the opportunity to promote the work that our students are doing to create a more equitable, enriching and safe environment at UNC Charlotte and in the greater community.”

Frenchie Brown ’91, president-elect of the Alumni Board of Directors, said, “Students who are marginalized because of the color of their skin, socio-economic status, sexual orientation and/or because they have a different belief system than the majority will have an opportunity to be valued and rewarded for speaking up and out about injustices for themselves and others. This scholarship is not being created for a moment in time; it will represent a movement for a lifetime of change.”

Krista Manns ’95, president of the Alumni Board of Directors, said, “This scholarship shows that the University is listening to the feedback of students, alumni, faculty and staff. Now more than ever, we must all remove our unconscious biases so that we are able to work together to make our community strong.”

In support of the Scholarship for Social Justice, the UNC Charlotte Foundation Board is matching, dollarfor-dollar, gifts made to the scholarship fund up to $125,000. To make a gift to the UNC Charlotte Alumni Association Scholarship for Social Justice, visit crowdfund.uncc.edu/socialjustice.

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Kat Lawrence

Charting a Course for a ‘Collective Impact’ B Y B Y R O N P. W H I T E

Associate Provost for Urban Research and Community Engagement Byron P. White joined the University in August 2020. He leads the Office of Urban Research and Community Engagement, formerly called Metropolitan Studies. The office will focus on connecting UNC Charlotte and the community through research, collaboration and engaged scholarship that builds a thriving, inclusive region. It comprises the UNC Charlotte Urban Institute, the Women + Girls Research Alliance, the Charlotte Action Research Project and Engaged Scholarship.

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ost growth cities do not pay serious attention to equity. They don’t have to.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg is different. And UNC Charlotte is critical to the region’s aspiration to ensure that every child and family benefit from the region’s economic growth, regardless of their race or ethnicity, city neighborhood or rural community.

That is the primary reason I was pleased to accept the invitation to join Provost Joan Lorden’s team as the University’s first associate provost for Urban Research and Community Engagement.

After dozens of mostly virtual interactions with stakeholders on and off campus since arriving, I am emboldened by the community’s and University’s mutual determination, which was fueled by an alarming study published

nearly four year ago that ranked CharlotteMecklenburg last among 50 cities in an analysis of economic mobility.

Charting the course

Since that report, two novel documents were written that have inspired me and that chart a course for our work ahead.

One is the University’s Civic Action Plan, developed by staff from across the institution as well as civic leaders. The other is the community’s Leading on Opportunity report, facilitated by the Foundation for the Carolinas with input from hundreds of community participants.

As an observer and leader of urban strategy for more than 30 years — as a journalist and researcher, as a community organizer

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and inner-city resident, and as a facilitator of partnerships between institutions and communities — I have seen my share of statements calling for community transformation. These two documents are distinctive in their focus, transparency and collective voice. The fact that they were issued in the same city around the same time makes them all the more remarkable.

UNC Charlotte’s Civic Action Plan calls for “organizing University resources, communitybased research efforts, and community collaborations to effectively address regional needs through collective impact.”

It foreshadowed the creation of the new Office for Urban Research and Community Engagement, which I now oversee, by calling for “a centralized structure, with dedicated staff, to coordinate and support the University’s community engagement efforts and assess collective impact.”

Particularly noteworthy is the plan’s willingness to highlight the unique array of challenges facing the region, particularly disparities related to race and geography, and to acknowledge the institution’s own struggles to address them adequately despite its many contributions to the community.

As a university administrator, I have seen few institutions so boldly express such shared accountability and responsibility.

economic demands of their regions to survive.

Not too long ago, colleges and universities tethered to urban areas were considered to be at a disadvantage, burdened by the hardships of urban life and too dependent on enrollees perceived to be less prepared for college, especially students of color and those from families of modest economic means. Today, association with the successes and plight of the cities where they are planted is central to their value proposition and sustainability.

The benefits go well beyond the direct impact on local issues. Positioning UNC Charlotte as a visible and indispensable part of the region’s focus on equity and economic mobility — which is being highlighted nationally — will continue to raise its stature as one of the nation’s premier urban universities. Sharply aligning research and curricula to community-defined outcomes will attract a diverse group of young learners who increasingly are seeking relevant, applied graduate and undergraduate study that directly confronts complex social problems.

Supporting and expanding faculty who are engaged in the community and deepening their partnerships will appeal to emerging higher education professionals who will want to be here and stay here.

Social and economic mobility

The Office of Urban Research and Community Engagement is charged with creating an infrastructure that allows these opportunities to flourish. Our work is focused in four overarching objectives that we are pursuing in collaboration with faculty, students, staff and administrators as well as with corporate, nonprofit, government and grassroots partners:

Likewise, as executive director of StrivePartnership in Cincinnati, I actively participated in a network of about 70 collective impact organizations in cities and rural communities across the country through StriveTogether. Not many were able to mobilize as unified a vision for their regions as the Leading on Opportunity’s focus on social and economic mobility.

These two powerful expressions reinforce a symbiotic relationship that is more critical now than ever as the nation’s urban areas grapple with a seemingly endless list of complex issues and as higher education navigates its own shifting landscape: Large cities and their surrounding areas need an anchor university to thrive. Urban universities must be relevant to solving the social and

Pragmatic plans

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Align research, curriculum and engagement around the community’s framework to promote social and economic mobility. By identifying “areas of impact” that are adopted by the community as a whole we can create a shared language for applying University scholarship and resources to community innovation. It also will provide a foundation for establishing metrics and assessment tools that build evidence for our common work.

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Establish a “community of engaged scholars” among faculty and researchers. It has not taken me long to discover the breadth of programs between UNC Charlotte and community partners.

Our goal is to help all those university participants — whether they lead onetime volunteer efforts or long-term research projects — to see themselves as an interdependent force bringing measurable impact to the community.

3

Leverage student leadership, skills and lived experiences as essential to our engagement success. Enlisting students who come from throughout our region, especially those from marginalized urban and rural places, and learning alongside them to address the problems in their communities is critical for success and creates a dynamic learning environment that better prepares all students for the future.

4

Deepen the community’s access to and influence in guiding the University’s research and outreach. Residents and civic leaders are becoming less enthralled by what universities do in the community and more interested in whether what we do produces systemic solutions. Creating channels where the community is confident that our efforts are driven by their priorities and aligned to their assets is critical to that assurance.

UNC Charlotte was well on its way to achieving these goals before I arrived. The groundwork laid by the Urban Institute, the UCity Family Zone and numerous centers, institutes and initiatives in every academic college as well as non-academic functions across campus make it possible to aspire for the “deeper commitment to public purpose” that the Civic Action Plan demands. I am excited to join my new colleagues — on campus and in the community — to pursue this charge with urgency.

Byron P. White, Ed.D., is associate provost for Urban Research and Community Engagement.

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Dynamic Deans New college leaders prepared for today’s challenges, tomorrow’s promise

BY SUSAN MESSINA

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ver the past year, four of UNC Charlotte’s seven academic colleges have welcomed new deans. With impressive credentials and fresh perspectives to coincide with the energy generated by the arrival of a new chancellor, these dynamic leaders are eager to apply their expertise to the opportunities facing their colleges and lessons of the current global pandemic to what they view as the bright future of higher education.

Arriving in fall 2019 were Brook Muller, dean, College of Arts + Architecture, from the University of Oregon, where he was director of the Portland Architecture Program and a professor in the Architecture Department, and Catrine Tudor-Locke, dean, College of Health and Human Services, from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where she was associate dean for research and administration for the School of Public Health and Sciences.

Arriving this fall are Robert Keynton, dean of The William States Lee College of Engineering, from the University of Louisville, where he was interim executive vice president for Research and Innovation, and the Lutz Endowed Chair of Biomechanical Devices in the Department of Engineering at the Speed School of Engineering, and Jennifer Troyer, who was appointed dean of the Belk College of Business after serving the college since 1999 as senior associate dean and professor of Economics, including the department’s chair, and associate dean for research and graduate programs.

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Brook Muller My decision to come here was reinforced on the first day of new faculty orientation in August 2019, which took place uptown, where conversations with city council members and leaders of nonprofits and community organizations made an enormous impression.

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What is it about UNC Charlotte that interested you in pursuing a position of leadership?

ROBERT KEYNTON: About 20 years ago, a former student informed me he was moving to Charlotte and planned to continue his degree in mechanical engineering at UNC Charlotte. Since then, I’ve followed the University’s progress and have been amazed — from both academic and research perspectives — by the outstanding growth of The William States Lee College of Engineering. With this opportunity, I was eager to learn more. The deeper I delved into the capabilities of the facilities, and quality of the faculty and staff — along with the positive collegial and collaborative environment — it became clear that UNC Charlotte is the place for me.

Considering the University’s research potential, in what areas do you see research growing? How important are community partners to this endeavor?

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Catrine Tudor-Locke

TROYER: The strongest potential for research growth is in interdisciplinary initiatives, where UNC Charlotte possesses considerable strength.

As a relatively young institution, the University is more nimble than some others and therefore able to connect across disciplinary silos. A great example is the new School of Data Science, which is already elevating the research of faculty across the University doing work in data science and analytics.

I was a first-generation, low-income student, so UNC Charlotte’s commitment to diversity, inclusion and equity speaks directly to me.

JENNIFER TROYER: When I arrived 21 years ago, the University had about 16,000 students. What attracted me then was the promise of growth — in Charlotte, in enrollment, particularly at the graduate level, and in the University’s research profile. The growth has been greater than I ever imagined. The Belk College of Business’ talented faculty and staff are researching business problems that are directly relevant to industry and policymakers, and our growing alumni base, exceptional teaching faculty and our business partners make great things happen in our community.

BROOK MULLER: The University’s urban research and community engagement commitments align perfectly with my work and values. Plus, I sensed strong optimism, open-mindedness and pride in the institution and its mission. My decision to come here was reinforced on the first day of new faculty orientation in August 2019, which took place uptown, where conversations with city council members and leaders of nonprofits and community organizations made an enormous impression.

CATRINE TUDOR-LOCKE: Like many UNC Charlotte students and alumni, I was a firstgeneration, low-income student, so UNC Charlotte’s commitment to diversity, inclusion and equity speaks directly to me. I lost both my parents by the time I turned 23 and had to chart a life path forward on my own. I am where I am today because of so many people who supported me every step of the way. I am excited about the opportunity to give back and help other students achieve their education, career and life goals.

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Robert Keynton The deeper I delved into the capabilities of the facilities, and quality of the faculty and staff — along with the positive collegial and collaborative environment — it became clear that UNC Charlotte is the place for me.

MULLER: We certainly can galvanize research activity around shared areas of interest across our academic units by addressing pressing challenges confronting contemporary society. Our ability to show that we are engaged in a vibrant, deeply relevant cross-college dialogue is key for attracting significant external funding. Overall, we must define research broadly; I recognize that the arts are seen by some as helping visualize the hard research occurring in the sciences, and yet if we are talking about meaning making, artistic sensibilities, practices and research have a central role to play.

TUDOR-LOCKE: UNC Charlotte is poised to ascend to R1 doctoral university classification

with very high research activity. Our researchers are already pushing their respective fields forward.

Our community partners, which include regional public health and social service units, hospitals and clinics, non-governmental agencies and corporations, are working with us to address knowledge gaps and opportunities through collaborative research.

KEYNTON: Cross-disciplinary collaborations on campus, together with strategic external partners, are critical for elevating the research profile of the University. My colleagues and I are currently looking into several new areas that will position the college and University as field leaders. At the same time, we see enormous opportunities for continued expansion in a number of areas that both the college and the University have established excellent research programs and garnered national attention.

What are the near-term priorities for your college?

MULLER: The College of Arts + Architecture aims to address issues of equity, anti-racism and social justice, and commit to increased internationalization and engagement of diverse and global perspectives.

It’s essential that we address environmental justice and contend with the impacts of climate change that will affect people disproportionately and unfairly. In this time beset with challenges, we must think boldly and position, through our programming, the arts and design as engines of civic imagination and social change.

TUDOR-LOCKE: Based on listening sessions and a stakeholder retreat that I led during my first year, top goals for CHHS are to expand several priorities in regard to partnerships and collaborations in teaching, research and community engagement; human, space, equipment and financial resources.

We also will enhance our commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion through action.

TROYER: This is a milestone year for the Belk College of Business as we celebrate the 50th anniversary of both the college and MBA program.

As others have indicated, we will deepen our level of activity in diversity, equity and inclusion, as we develop a new, five-year strategic plan.

KEYNTON: I plan to identify synergies between engineering programs and those across campus to

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develop multidisciplinary programs that impact the Charlotte region and our country. Another goal is to reevaluate how we deliver engineering education, with an eye toward developing new paradigms for top-quality learning environments for our students to enhance their ability to assimilate immediately into the workforce. I’m especially interested in fostering innovation within the college to encourage faculty, staff and students to translate their discoveries into technologies and products that will benefit society and contribute to the economic development of the region. Finally, we’ll promote our strengths across different media platforms to raise awareness for the college and UNC Charlotte at the national and international levels.

The circumstances of 2020 have changed the landscape of higher education. What is the value proposition for students?

TUDOR-LOCKE: In many ways, the pandemic and the swift pivot to remote learning accelerated

a trend toward enhancing pedagogy with various technologies. It pushed our professors and our students to quickly acquire, practice, and ultimately, master new interpersonal skills necessary to successfully navigate the virtual space.

For students, these newly honed presentation and collaboration skills will translate very well to the workplace. But the greater life lessons that our students benefited from this year by being part of the UNC Charlotte community during this challenging time include cooperation, experimentation, ingenuity, advocacy, solidarity and resilience.

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Jennifer Troyer What attracted me was the promise of growth — in Charlotte, in enrollment, particularly at the graduate level and in the University’s research profile. The growth has been greater than I ever imagined.

KEYNTON: The shift to remote learning modalities has certainly taught all of us to be resilient and to persevere through life’s challenges to achieve our goals. The students have been exceptional at dealing with these challenges and realize the value of having the ability to continue progressing in their curriculum to ensure they achieve their degrees in a timely manner. At the Fall 2020

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same time, social injustice issues have come to the forefront and institutions are having open and candid discussions on ways to address and combat these injustices on college campuses.

Universities are developing training programs and courses to address unconscious bias, anti-biasing strategies, power and privilege, culture and microversus macro aggressions. These add value to the educational experience and, hopefully, will yield a more positive, collaborative and empathetic learning environment.

MULLER: My mentor and former dean Frances Bronet, now president of the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, points out that this is exactly the time to be in college. People are exploring new platforms for education, critical practice and communication like never before, and students should absolutely play a part in experimenting with these emerging modalities. Let us figure this out together — not presume that faculty have full expertise. Assume the intelligence of those we work with, provide the resources, facilitate a process and ask students to help us invent this new educational landscape.

TROYER: It is indeed an ideal time to invest in yourself. Regardless of whether they are learning and connecting on Zoom or in person, students in the Belk College of Business have access to high quality peers, outstanding faculty who are working diligently to make the course experience as effective as possible, professional development opportunities and a large network of alumni.

What will higher education look like on the other side of this; how should the industry prepare?

KEYNTON: Higher education will be forever changed for the better since educators have now gained a greater appreciation for employing different teaching modalities, platforms and tools for delivering course content. Since every student learns differently, I believe educators will deliver course material more efficiently and effectively using the broad spectrum of tools, resulting in a greater number of students comprehending the material successfully. As a result, the industry will need to move away from traditional educational paradigms and implement these, as well as new technologies and resources to improve the educational experience of our students.

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TUDOR-LOCKE: 2020 shook us loose from some traditions and allowed us to think creatively in response to new necessities. We now have the opportunity to leverage these new experiences and evolve. There will doubtless be a continued focus on equity and outcomes. We will be re-examining our policies and procedures and questioning their impacts, so data will become increasingly important to guiding the actions that will be expected. There will be increased emphasis on career preparedness, including expanding opportunities for projectbased learning, internships, co-operative education programs and other work experiences. This emphasis will require more expansive and closer interactions with community and corporate partners as we develop the infrastructure to support important training pipelines that include, but extend well beyond, the undergraduate experience.

TROYER: During the pandemic, faculty have invested in upgrading their skills in the area of online course delivery. Students have learned to learn online and learned about their preferred mode of delivery While I do not see face-to-face instruction going away, I see more opportunities for online program offerings and online components to faceto-face classes that facilitate learning.

MULLER: The impacts of COVID on arts and design education are enormous and will be longlasting. What gives me optimism and solace is to witness the inventiveness of our faculty in terms of developing new mediums for expression and critical dialogue. Theater faculty, for example, are exploring virtual performances that will be part of our programming forever. And yet we are not only dealing with COVID; we absolutely have to consider how Black Lives Matter will change higher education positively and irrevocably, as well as the current crisis in democracy characterized by extreme partisanship and inability to find common ground. How can higher education and especially, for us, higher education in the arts and design, address these deeply consequential matters? On the other side of this challenging period, let us remember what the arts mean for society. People look to the arts in such times as a way to come to terms with the feeling of helplessness and senselessness. People also look to the arts when they seek uplift and joy. They are central to our experience as human beings.

Susan Messina is director of News & Information for University Communications.

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Sustaining a tradition of strong leadership UNC Charlotte’s history of strong leadership extends from its founding to today, continuing with its newest leaders (page 44) as well as its longstanding academic deans. Here, Dean Nancy Gutierrez, who has led the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences (CLAS) since 2005; Dean Fatma Mili, who arrived in 2017 to lead

the College of Computing and Informatics (CCI); and Teresa Petty, who is serving the Cato College of Education (COE) as interim dean, share their insights about leadership, the University’s impact on important societal issues and equipping students to lead where and when it matters.

Nancy Gutierrez

Fatma Mili

Teresa Petty

CLAS

CCI

COE

“This environment is an incubator for leadership. Because of its commitment to access, UNC Charlotte welcomes students from a breadth of our social, economic and cultural strata. It embraces difference and heterogeneity, thus building an environment where quirkiness is accepted and risk-taking is celebrated. ‘Leadership’ is a word that should be coupled with ‘opportunity.’ The environment created, simply by virtue of the diverse and eclectic community on campus, offers all of us the space to grow individually and to build the institution. This ‘opportunity’ has attracted individuals who were primed to grow as leaders. Students and faculty come here to grow as human beings and, by so doing, grow the institution.”

“The COVID-19 pandemic, the national awakening to the breadth and depth of enduring racial injustice and violence, as well as the acceleration of severe weather events are symptoms of a system delivering results most of us do not want.

Compounded crises add a sense of urgency to the unique role universities can and must play, which has dramatically accelerated several efforts already underway at UNC Charlotte. For example, as remote learning has brought to the surface the inequity in student needs and conditions, it also focused our faculty on redesigning their teaching and learning environments to personalize learning, maximize student engagement and democratize access.

Similarly, the complexity and multifaceted nature of the current crises have been a catalyst for all colleges at UNC Charlotte to collaborate, sharing resources and ideas across disciplines. At CCI alone, the number of cross-college collaborations on research proposals has more than doubled.”

“In the field of education, equity can be defined as giving each student the tools needed to be successful, which is different from equality, which means all students receive the same tools. As the Cato College of Education leads by example in training new educators to be aware of this difference and prepares them to advocate for and foster equity in their schools and classrooms, we aim to increase diversity in our student population through targeted recruitment efforts. Recent faculty professional development around the issues of diversity, equity and inclusion will guide us toward developing specific action items to support faculty and students as they develop the skills and confidence to champion equity here at UNC Charlotte and in their professional environments.”

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The E.K. and Dorrie Fretwell Building is the administrative home for the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, but the college’s 19 academic departments, two military science departments and 20-plus interdisciplinary centers and programs are located across the University.

More than 8,100 undergraduate students and nearly 900 graduate students are enrolled in the college, which offers 78 undergraduate, 25 master’s and 10 doctoral degree options.

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In this pre-COVID photo, Nancy Gutierrez, dean of the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, speaks with students at a college event.

Future-oriented As it marks its 40th anniversary, the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences (CLAS) continues to create, collaborate and innovate.

LY N N R O B E R S O N

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he College of Liberal Arts & Sciences has a long history of re-inventing itself and inspiring others to do the same,” said Dean Nancy A. Gutierrez. “One thing we have never done is stay static, especially as societal issues have grown increasingly complex.

Our ability to anticipate and adapt is crucial as the world confronts a global pandemic, climate change, justice and equity challenges, challenges to democracy, economic upheaval and other significant issues.”

A constant for the college is its central emphasis on ensuring students are prepared for work, citizenship and life.

“For undergraduate students, we are focused on redefining what liberal learning means, to prepare them to be tomorrow’s leaders and citizens — with a deep understanding of what justice and equity mean, so they can lead with that mindset,”

Gutierrez said. “This dynamic redefinition holds particular significance in health, the environment and humanistic areas.”

The approach includes course work drawn from cross-cutting fields of study as well as experiential learning. The goal is for students to leave the college with a stronger sense of self and with firm confidence in their abilities to take risks and manage the unexpected.

“Data indicate that students who engage in liberal arts and sciences experiences can improve their economic status and social mobility,” Gutierrez said. “This means that our redefinition of the liberal arts and sciences directly impacts our focus on social justice. Because the 21st century has shown us that disruption happens and that career paths are often nonlinear, we provide students with the tools to develop resilience and grit to navigate unsettling times.”

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CLAS LEADS

CLAS Points of Pride $11.86 million in research awards (2019) 2,053 research products or publications (2019) 35-plus Faculty Fulbright recipients U.S. News & World Report ranks Master of Public Administration program in top 21% and Clinical Health Psychology doctoral program in top 38% nationally The Financial Engineer ranked the math finance master’s program no.

14 nationally

A cornerstone effort is LEADS, a program that inspires innovative thinking and creative problem solving through a variety of programming and classes. Students who complete 10 credit hours of LEADS classes can earn a Certificate in Leadership, Innovation, Technology and Diversity. Students also participate in internships with organizations including Discovery Place and Mecklenburg County Park and Recreation.

“LEADS has helped me realize my abilities and work ethic,” said political science major Hiral Patel.

“I was not the type of person to speak in front of crowds, and taking the introductory courses for LEADS in my freshman year helped me realize that it’s not that hard as long as I am prepared and know what I am talking about.”

Through LEADS and its explorations of disciplines and careers, including an internship with Discovery Place, Patel has added to her studies classes in economics and capitalism studies. She has decided to pursue a career in corporate law and policy.

More broadly, the college offers intensive research opportunities that are often interdisciplinary in nature, particularly for graduate students. In the

future, the college intends to develop cutting-edge doctoral programs, such as digital cultures and communications, along with new master’s level degrees. Currently, the college offers 10 doctoral degrees, 25 master’s degrees and 19 graduate certificates, along with its 78 undergraduate degree options.

A historical perspective

The College of Arts and Sciences was created when then-Chancellor E.K. Fretwell Jr. brought together the individual Colleges of Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences and Science and Mathematics in 1980.

A year earlier, in his installation address, Fretwell stressed that under his leadership, the University would continue to emphasize the recognized value of the arts and sciences while addressing the civic needs of the Charlotte region and serving a more diverse student body. The college has proven critical to fulfilling these goals, which subsequent chancellors have also embraced.

Although the college marks 1980 as its official year of origin, and 2008 as its reinvention as the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, CLAS actually dates to the University’s founding period. When the Charlotte Center opened its doors to returning veterans in 1946, its first full-time teacher, Mary

Home of three UNC Charlotte Chancellor’s Professors and three recipients of UNC System’s Holshouser Award for Excellence in Public Service

Chancellor E.K. Fretwell, pictured with University founder Bonnie Cone, combined three colleges to create the College of Arts and Sciences in 1980.

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CLAS Points of Pride 14 graduate students received research awards of national or international significance during the past four years including three from the National Science Foundation, two from National Institutes of Health and one from the U.S. Department of Defense Bertha Maxwell-Roddey and the late Mary Harper helped co-found the now Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts + Culture.

Denny, taught English courses. She was joined by part-time teachers in math, Spanish and biology, disciplines now positioned in CLAS. Since those early days, CLAS has expanded to encompass 19 academic departments, two military science departments and more than 20 interdisciplinary centers and programs, including its

In the past five years, CLAS has created 76 new inventions, filed 68 patents with 51 issued and started six companies

partnership with three other colleges in the School of Data Science. The newest department, Writing, Rhetoric, and Digital Studies, is the first academic department of its kind in the Carolinas.

The Women’s and Gender Studies Program, currently offering a minor, also is seeking to establish a major. Meanwhile, the college has expanded

The UNC Charlotte Botanical Gardens began under the leadership of Bonnie Cone and biology professor Herbert Hechenbleikner, left, and Schley Lyons, right, served as the second dean of the College of Arts and Sciences; as a political science professor, he helped launch Leadership Charlotte.

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CLAS centers and interdisciplinary partnerships • •

enter for Professional C and Applied Ethics enter for Applied C Geographic Information Science

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enter for Holocaust, C Genocide and Human Rights Studies

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enter for the Study of C the New South

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enter for C Optoelectronics and Optical Communications

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harlotte Teachers C Institute

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School of Data Science

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UNC Charlotte Botanical Gardens

Wenwu Tang is executive director for the Center for Applied Geographic Information Science, which has collaborated with government and health officials on water issues, COVID-19 and the city’s vanishing tree canopy.

interdisciplinary minors in response to the needs of students, employers and society. Those include areas such as biotechnology, capitalism studies, health and medical humanities, legal studies, Latin American studies and Southern studies. Last year, the college added dual master’s degrees in anthropology/public health in collaboration with the College of Health and Human Services.

“The College of Liberal Arts & Sciences has maintained the centrality of the liberal arts and sciences to the University’s mission, by interpreting traditional disciplines in a contemporary context, promoting the connections across disciplines and championing emerging disciplines,” said Joan F. Lorden, provost and vice chancellor for Academic Affairs. “With its broad array of graduate and undergraduate programs, CLAS is essential to the University’s ability to fulfill our educational, scholarly and community engagement commitments.”

CLAS partners to benefit the community

Beyond its own departments and disciplines, the college has long served as an engine of intellectual innovation across the University and in the community.

“The areas of knowledge that are housed in the college provide a core element to virtually all the areas of knowledge in other academic colleges,” Gutierrez said. “This means that the college often 54 UNC CHARLOTTE magazine

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incubates new areas of thinking. For example, computer science grew from math, and contributed to the emergence of the College of Computing and Informatics. Likewise with fine arts, which are now part of the College of Arts + Architecture, and social work, now in the College of Health and Human Services. CLAS faculty were instrumental in the founding of the Urban Institute. Our disciplines are essential to the School of Data Science, with its role in bridging the gap between society and technology.”

According to Gutierrez, connecting society and technology, particularly the ethical use of data and technology, cannot occur without the faculty expertise and disciplines from CLAS, including philosophy and applied ethics, sociology, anthropology, geography, criminal justice, Africana Studies, psychology, public policy and more.

CLAS leaders and alumni have had significant influence in the broader community:

•

College faculty championed the creation of the

•

The college has developed more than 90 active

first Black Studies programs in the 1960s and went on to found the Afro-American Cultural Center, now the Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts + Culture. Also, faculty provided leadership and expertise in the establishment of the University City area. research and engagement partnerships with

[

community organizations, offering students and faculty opportunities to apply their research and knowledge. These include diverse organizations such as the Electric Power Research Institute, the Gantt Center, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Food Policy Advisory Council, the Atrium Health Systems, Clean Air Charlotte and International House.

•

The Charlotte Teachers Institute (CTI) is

an innovative partnership among CharlotteMecklenburg Schools, UNC Charlotte, and Johnson C. Smith University. Through intensive, semester-long seminars led by faculty from UNC Charlotte and Johnson C. Smith University, CMS teachers learn new content, work collaboratively with other district teachers and develop curriculum units for their own classrooms.

•

The Department of Mathematics and

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The college houses centers that confront topics

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The Center for the Study of the New South

state’s development. A team composed of the University’s Center for the Study of the New South, Botanical Gardens and Urban Institute received a grant from the North Carolina Humanities Council for the project.

As these and countless other efforts make a difference today in creating knowledge and connections for students and for the community, the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences will continue to evolve, as does the world.

“Stay tuned for the next 40 years,” said Gutierrez.

Lynn Roberson is director of communications for the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences.

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“The areas of knowledge that are housed in the college provide a core element to virtually all the areas of knowledge in other academic colleges.”

– D E AN N AN CY G U TI E RRE Z

Statistics, and departments in the natural sciences — Biological Sciences, Chemistry, Geography and Earth Sciences and Physics and Optical Science — work closely with local school systems and educators. Faculty and students take science experiments into classrooms, and bring teachers and students into UNC Charlotte labs and the natural world for experiential learning. They also offer hands-on science activities at the annual UNC Charlotte Science and Technology Expo, part of the N.C. Science Festival. important to the broader community, including the Botanical Gardens, known for its native plant collection and classes, and the Center for Professional and Applied Ethics, which works with the community on ethical issues. The Center for Applied Geographic Information Science (CAGIS) collaborates with governments and health officials on water issues, COVID-19 research and the vanishing tree canopy. looks deeply with community partners into topics centered around what it means to be Southern in an increasingly diverse world, and the accompanying issues. One of its latest initiatives, an outdoor, living exhibit under construction in the Botanical Gardens, tells the story of North Carolina through plants and crops crucial to the

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LEAVE A LASTING LEGACY We knew this was the opportunity to make a new commitment and be of service to the students at UNC Charlotte.

Having served on various UNC Charlotte boards over the past dozen years, we knew where we could have an impact, and thus we created scholarships for athletics and for students from military families with a planned gift.

Both of our personal family histories include numerous individuals who have served our country, representing all service groups. We personally could not think of a better way to remember their acts of service, and a planned gift enabled us to do more than we otherwise could. We are always proud to be Charlotte 49ers!”

–Karen and Michael Reavis

Michael and Karen Reavis have been supporters of UNC Charlotte’s mission for many years, reaching back to their graduation in the late 1970s. Michael received his bachelor’s degree in economics in 1977, and Karen received her bachelor’s degree in political science in 1979.

In these uncertain times, there’s a way to support UNC Charlotte without affecting your disposable income. To learn more, contact the Office of Planned Giving.

Amy Shehee Director of Planned Giving 704-687-0301 ashehee@uncc.edu

49ers Notebook

Head coach Will Healy and the Charlotte 49ers football team sport new branded athletics gear.

Charlotte 49ers launch a new look

D

uring summer 2020, the Charlotte 49ers Athletics Department rolled out a bold new brand identity that has received a strong, growing response from Niner Nation.

“The response to the brand rollout has been really positive,” said Chris Fuller, deputy athletics director for external affairs, who oversaw the rebranding project. “Like any change of this nature, there have been critics, but the more our 49ers family has connected with the new look, the stronger the response has grown. As fans started to see it on their own gear and used by our student-athletes

and staff, the more energized they became.

Once we’re able to resume competition postCOVID-19 and start attaching success, we’ll have a chance to win everyone over.”

The centerpiece of the new look is a distinctive mark called the “All-In C.” An evolution from the previous Charlotte athletics logo, it places the iconic 49ers’ gold-mining pick inside a collegiate-inspired “C.” “We’re thrilled to have a new bolder identity that not only reflects our commitment to excellence but encompasses the pride this community has for our institution as well as our strong connection to our dynamic city,” said

49ers Director of Athletics Mike Hill, giving a nod to the popular secondary “CLT” mark.

The project, completed by Luquire George Andrews, includes a deeper green, the primary and secondary marks and a BoldRush tagline.

“We chose to use BoldRush as part of the brand launch to signal our state of mind as a program,” Fuller added. “To let our friends and supporters know that we have every intention of building on the momentum the Charlotte 49ers had when we were all forced to pause.” (Read about alumnus Todd Aldridge ’92, the creative force behind the brand redesign, on page 58.)

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Todd Aldridge stands on the court of Halton Arena emblazoned with the new logo he designed for the Charlotte 49ers.

Alum Forges Bold New Athletic Brand for Charlotte 49ers

BY PAU L N OW E L L

T

odd Aldridge’s connections to UNC Charlotte run wide and deep, which made creating the 49ers’ new Athletics brand a personal challenge for him when he was tasked with it.

“I was worried I was too close to the University,” said Aldridge ’92, senior vice president and executive creative director for Luquire George Andrews (LGA), a Charlotte-based strategic communications firm withs several UNC Charlotte alumni on its roster.

A distinguished alumnus of UNC Charlotte’s College of Arts + Architecture, Aldridge and his family have ties to the University that span nearly 50 years and three generations. This legacy was not lost on him when he heard about the rebranding plans.

“Would I be able to keep the fan in me out of the process?” he asked rhetorically.

Then he went to work on what he calls “a labor of love.”

“The deeper we got into the discussions, the more I felt that I could better serve the Athletics Department and the agency by contributing to a design that syncs the program with the city and its many students, alumni and corporate partners,” he said.

For Aldridge, this was far from just another assignment.

“At LGA, each project, no matter the size of the client or the scope, means something not only to the businesses we partner with, but their employees and their clients,” he said. “The Charlotte 49ers brand means so much to LGA and my family, I was honored to be a part of the team.”

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Wade Bruton

Todd Aldridge

With recent 49ers success in a number of areas, it was decided the time was right for a new brand — the first since 2000.

Last year, the Charlotte football team posted a winning record and qualified for the first bowl game in University history. After several subpar seasons, the men’s basketball team finished 16-13 in the last regular season.

Prior to the interference of COVID-19 in athletics schedules, 49ers women’s basketball as well as men’s and women’s soccer qualified consistently for postseason action. Other teams, such as women’s golf and track and field for both men and women, have been surprising their opponents.

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In 1996, when Halton Arena opened, LGA was asked to design the original floor. “Trying to leverage a little bit of 49er history in something new, we proposed using the old script 49ers as the mark. The alumni magazine featured it before it opened,” said Aldridge, posing with both logos.

Aldridge knew the outcome had to be grounded in research, a process that included online surveys, emails to alumni and in-depth interviews with key University stakeholders.

“I was especially excited to see part of that process was having a student advisory committee that provided candid feedback from one of our target audiences,” he said.

The new mark needed to be easily reproduced and standardized. And it had to be bold, simplified and smart, Aldridge said.

The new “All in C” logo puts the 49ers gold pick inside the “C,” with the letter and the symbol together instead of as individual elements. Alternate versions of

the logo, including a CLT, 49ers and 9ers, also incorporate the gold pick in the C and the 9s.

“We kept scale top of mind,” Aldridge explained. “So many uses for sports branding elements are small. We wanted to separate from those marks and not allow other logos to overpower it.”

According to Athletics Director Mike Hill, it was important for the new athletics mark to be straightforward and clean. It was critical that it showed strong ties to the Charlotte community.

“Our competitive ascent and rise in relevance is clear,” he said. “So while we never would have planned for a rebrand in

the middle of a worldwide pandemic, the time was indeed right.”

And it achieved another goal — it got people talking. “It certainly did, both within our Niner family and also at a regional and national level,” Hill said.

“They absolutely nailed it,” he said about LGA. “To have an alumnus in Todd who was so emotionally invested in the project was key to its success. As he would say, it was a true labor of love, and that was clear not only with Todd but with the entire LGA team.”

So are the fans embracing it?

“Overall, the new logo has been extremely well received. Many of our fans absolutely love it, while others are still adjusting,” Hill said. “The feedback nationally has been spectacular. It’s important that our brand be seen among other regionally and nationally recognized brands.”

Both of Aldridge’s parents worked for the University for more than 20 years.

Many other family members, including his wife, sister and niece, graduated from UNC Charlotte. Most recently, his son, a Levine Scholar, earned his degree from UNC Charlotte.

Over the years, Aldridge has paid forward his positive UNC Charlotte experience. He started a student chapter of the American Institute of Graphic Arts on campus for design students. He has been a guest speaker for senior seminars, and he conducts portfolio reviews for students.

This year, he joined the UNC Charlotte Alumni Association Board of Directors, and he is teaching an online course in graphic design.

“UNC Charlotte has given so much to my family and me,” Aldridge said. “It’s an honor and privilege to have opportunities to give something back.”

Paul Nowell is a senior communications manager for University Communications.

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Fall postponements to lead to busy schedule in spring Spring 2021 is expected to be a busy time for Charlotte 49ers athletics. In August, Conference USA announced the postponement of the fall seasons for men’s and women’s soccer and volleyball due to the coronavirus pandemic after the NCAA Division I Board of Directors decided to move Division I fall championships to the spring. The only sports to compete during their regular fall seasons were football and men’s and women’s cross country.

“We want all of our teams to be well-positioned for postseason play,” said Charlotte’s Director of Athletics Mike Hill. “We spoke with our coaches, and they wanted to move to the spring to coincide with NCAA Championships.

On top of that, our non-conference Mike Hill scheduling opportunities have been limited due to the majority of other conferences moving to the spring. Our student-athletes and coaches have been remarkable during this time of uncertainty, and we can’t wait to see them compete next spring.”

The move to the spring for those sports adds to an already full plate that includes baseball, softball, men’s and women’s golf, men’s and women’s tennis, and men’s and women’s outdoor track and field. Men’s and women’s basketball seasons were pushed back to an earliest-possible start date of Nov. 25, while men’s and women’s indoor track and field was impacted, too.

Individual members of the men’s and women’s golf and tennis programs competed as individuals in the fall in various tournaments, although the teams did not see action.

Find the most up-to-date sports schedules online at Charlotte49ers.com.

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Rose selected for C-USA Hall of Fame Accolades for Judy Rose, director emerita of the Charlotte 49ers, continue to add up.

Already named to the N.C. Sports Hall of Fame and the first class of UNC Charlotte’s Athletics Hall of Fame, Judy Rose will join Conference USA’s second Hall of Fame class.

Rose led the 49ers into Conference USA as a charter member in 1995-96 and again in 2013-14, when Charlotte was invited back to the FBS conference thanks to the addition of UNC Charlotte’s football team.

One of the nation’s most respected directors of athletics (AD), Rose spent 43 years with the Charlotte 49ers Athletics Department, including 28 as AD. She became the third woman to serve as the athletics director of an NCAA Division I program when she accepted the position in 1990.

Rose is the second person to represent the 49ers in the Conference USA Hall of Fame. Last year, Charlotte 49ers all-America

goalkeeper Jon Busch, who led the 49ers to the 1996 NCAA College Cup, was inducted as part of the league’s inaugural class. That team, which reached the NCAA National Semifinals in Conference USA’s second season, became the first C-USA program in any sport to reach the final four.

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The 49ers Athletics Hall of Fame was established to recognize exemplary student-athletes, coaches or administrators; individuals whose contributions have brought distinction to the University’s athletics program also can be enshrined.

These are the 49ers Athletics Hall of Fame inaugural inductees:

Jon Busch

Men’s Soccer (1994-96) “It was an honor to be part of the first team to make it to the Final Four. I am extremely proud to have been part of that moment for the team and the school. It’s an amazing award to receive that speaks volumes about the guys who I was with during those three years and the guys who came before me.”

Shareese Woods Hicks Track and Field (2003-07)

“My fondest memory as a 49er was getting the opportunity to represent my family, my coach, my teammates and the university on the NCAA stage. My time with the 49ers was nothing short of amazing, both academically and athletically.

Everyone from the professors to the athletics administration made a positive impact on the professional that I have become. My sincerest thanks to you all!”

Cedric Maxwell

Men’s Basketball (1973-77) “It’s so cool for a little small town kid from Kinston to come to Charlotte and be honored as one of the outstanding representatives of the school. It was a marriage made in heaven. It was a young program on the uptick, and I was a young player on the uptick, and we branched into a beautiful dance.

Everything happened the right way.”

Corey Nagy

Men’s Golf (2007-10) “Born and raised in Charlotte, I have always felt a strong connection to this University, and I have wonderful memories that I will cherish forever.

I was lucky to be around amazing coaches, teammates and staff, all of whom had a huge part in helping me succeed during my time as a 49er. I will be a lifelong supporter and wish this University and all of its student-athletes continued success for years to come. GO NINERS!”

Judy Rose

Director of Athletics (1991-2018) “I have so many wonderful memories from both coaching and administration. I am proud that we were able to provide our student-athletes and coaches with first-class facilities to enhance their experience and present opportunities to host conference and NCAA events. When you spend 43 years working in 49er athletics (1976 to 2018), it is difficult to key in on one memory, but I would have to say that the overall excitement at our first home football game would be it. The students, alumni, faculty, staff, along with donors and friends of the Niners, all wearing 49er apparel cheering for their team. I still get chills reminiscing about that day!“

Lee Rose

Men’s Basketball Head Coach (1975-78) ‘My three years with the 49ers were beyond special. The national stage that we all were on was, and still is, shared by those who were in Charlotte at that time.

From the first-year win over N.C. State in the semifinal game of the NIT, to the NCAA Final Four a year later, we all worked hard to be the best team we could be. One of my most cherished memories is returning to Charlotte from the Mideast Regional victory over no.

1-ranked Michigan.

It isn’t always so that the community supports an athletics team.

However, when the airport was filled with thousands of fans to greet us, and part of the runway was closed for our plane, the connection among the team, school and community, and the feeling of shared success and pride was simply magical.”

Dale F. Halton Philanthropist

“I treasure my relationship with the University and especially the Athletics Department and the student-athletes. It’s a great program and a great school, and I love being involved with them.”

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Charlotte 49ers basketball coaches shape teams’ culture

BY TOM WHITESTONE

For Cara Consuegra, it’s all H.E.A.R.T. Cara Consuegra enters her 10th season as the head women’s basketball coach for the Charlotte 49ers in 2020-21. She ranks second in program history for head coaching wins, owning a 165-113 (.594) record with five postseason appearances during her tenure. She needs just 10 victories to match the school’s career standard. But, there’s something much deeper at the heart of her program.

“Our Charlotte Women’s Basketball program is built on the foundation of ‘Play with H.E.A.R.T.’ which stands for Heart, Effort, Accountability, Respect and Toughness,” Consuegra explains. “This foundation is the core of our team and is a vital part of our success in basketball, academics, leadership and character development. At Charlotte, we are preparing women to win basketball games, and, most important, to become future leaders who are prepared to make positive contributions in their communities and beyond.”

Consuegra implemented her program’s core values of H.E.A.R.T at the outset of her decade of excellence with the program. She has produced one conference player of the year, a national freshman of the week, four all-conference first team picks, six 1,000-point scorers and eight conference all-defensive team selections. Three times the 49ers have been featured on ESPN SportsCenter’s Top 10 Plays of the Day, and seven of her players have signed professional contracts post-graduation.

Respected among her peers, Consuegra boasts a pedigree that includes being a WNBA draftee, an honorable mention All-America as a senior in college and earning Most Outstanding Player honors of the Big Ten Tournament, as she guided her alma mater Iowa to an upset win in the championship game.

Ron Sanchez relies on ‘The Five Pillars’ The Five Pillars of Humility, Passion, Unity, Servanthood and Thankfulness are the bedrock of the men’s basketball culture at Charlotte.

Head coach Ron Sanchez, who is in his third season, was introduced to these pillars during his coaching experience under father and son Dick and Tony Bennett at Washington State University and the University of Virginia.

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words. Our culture equals our people. When I took this job, I put a staff together that embodies these pillars, and we recruit to these pillars.”

THE FIVE PILLARS: Humility: Know who you are Passion: Do not be lukewarm Unity: A house divided will not stand Servanthood: Make those around you better Thankfulness: Be grateful in every circumstance “Each of these pillars is tied to the next one,” Sanchez said. “We have to be willing to serve one another. Without humility, how can you serve? And, if you are not united as a group, how passionate can you be as a team?”

The pillars were fashioned by legendary college coach Dick Bennett.

Sanchez served under Bennett on his staff at Washington State for three seasons beginning in 2003. Bennett then passed the pillars down to his son, three-time National Coach of the Year Tony Bennett, who Sanchez also worked with at Washington State and later at Virginia, where he was an integral member of his coaching staff and the rebuilding of both programs. When Sanchez was hired by 49ers Director of Athletics Mike Hill in March 2018, he knew the pillars would be the cornerstone of what he wanted to build in the Queen City.

“These pillars are embedded into my fiber as a coach,” Sanchez said.

“I have seen them work in constructing culture, in building programs. I truly believe that if a program values these principles, not only will they be successful on the court but off the court as well. Each pillar plays a pivotal role in what we are trying to build here at Charlotte.”

The 49ers took a major step forward last season as Charlotte finished with a 16-13 overall mark and set a school record with 13 home wins at Halton Arena. The squad posted a 10-8 Conference USA record, the most league victories by the Niners since 2005-06.

Their 16 wins were the most by the 49ers since 2013-14. In addition to the success on the court, the 49ers also earned the NABC Team Academic Excellence Award for the first time in the program’s history.

Graduate senior Amidou Bamba became just the second Charlotte basketball player to be named an Academic All-American.

Tom Whitestone is associate athletics director for media relations for the Charlotte 49ers.

Class Notes 1980s

Albert

Craig Albert ’85 was named president and chief operating officer of Bechtel Corporation.

Albert, who joined the company in 1998, has led the infrastructure segment since 2016. Prior to that, he headed the 2011 merger of the company’s commercial nuclear power business and its defense and national security unit to form its nuclear, security and environmental business segment, of which he served as segment president for five years. He received a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from UNC Charlotte.

Community College and spent more than 20 years at Wilkes Community College in a variety of leadership roles. Hauser earned a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from UNC Charlotte.

Jeff James ’83, ’93, ’05 was named superintendent of Iredell-Statesville Schools. He began his educational career with Iredell-Statesville Schools in 2002 after 22 year in the private sector. In 2013, he became assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction for Montgomery County Schools.

From there he served as superintendent of Stanly County Schools in 2018.

James earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration, a master’s degree in business administration and a master’s degree in special education from UNC Charlotte.

Nantz

Hauser

John Hauser ’89 was named president of Gaston College.

He previously served as president of Carteret

Mark Nantz ’87 was named president and CEO of Valley Health. Previously, he was chief administrative officer and Atlantic group president with Bon Secours Mercy Health. He has held executive

positions at Carolinas Healthcare System (now Atrium Health). As a certified public accountant, he held a leadership role at accounting firm KPMG International Corp.

Nantz earned a bachelor’s degree in accounting from UNC Charlotte.

1990s Patrick Brown ’99 was named president and CEO of OEConnection LLC. Previously, he was president and CEO at Innovative Aftermarket Systems (IAS), a leading provider of technology and finance and insurance solutions to the automotive industry. He received a master’s degree in business administration from UNC Charlotte.

Susan Clissold ’90 was promoted to senior vice president and commercial lender at Southern Bank.

A 29-year veteran of the banking industry, Clissold also is secretary on the Outer Banks Relief Foundation Board of Directors. She received a bachelor’s degree in psychology from UNC Charlotte.

Eric Herbst ’92 was named coastal aquaculture specialist at the N.C. State University Center for Marine Sciences and Technology in Morehead City. In this role, Herbst will support the development, expansion and diversification of the state’s coastal

aquaculture industries, including shellfish, finfish and algal species. He will lead a variety of ongoing and emerging coastal aquaculture projects in the state, including those focusing on education and outreach, technology transfer and applied research.

He earned a bachelor’s degree in Spanish from UNC Charlotte.

Houser

Crystal Houser ’96, ’09 was named principal of the year for Gaston County Schools for the 2020-21 academic year. She is principal of Forestview High School.

Houser earned a bachelor’s degree in biology, a teaching certificate in comprehensive science and a master’s degree in school administration and curriculum and instruction from UNC Charlotte.

Don Munkwitz ’90, ’95 was appointed senior vice president of strategy and execution for Paradigm Catastrophic Care Management. In this role, he is responsible for leading the division’s strategic planning and growth initiatives. He earned a bachelor’s degree in economics and a master’s

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Worker Climbing Specialist, a Tree Care Industry Association Certified Treecare Safety Professional and is ISA Certified Tree Risk Assessment Qualified. He earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from UNC Charlotte.

Katie Campbell ’06 was named director of children’s theatre and performing arts at the Arkansas Arts Center. She also is a board member of Theatre for Young Audiences USA, a national membership organization that strengthens the artistic and cultural impact of theatre for young audiences. Campbell earned a bachelor’s degree in theatre from UNC Charlotte.

Munkwitz

degree in business administration from UNC Charlotte.

Kimble

Kimble joined the company in 2017 as director. Previously, he was vice president at Wells Fargo. He also had a four-year tenure with Charlotte Center City Partners as an economic development associate. He earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from UNC Charlotte.

2010s

Owens-Velasquez

Caché Owens-Velasquez ’15, ’20 was named director of the Beauregard Center, the cultural hub at the University of New Hampshire. Previously, she worked at UNC Charlotte focusing on the areas of education, inclusion, equity and cultural responsiveness.

She earned a master’s degree in geography and a doctorate in urban and regional analysis from UNC Charlotte.

Sumpter

Nikki Sumpter ’94 was honored by the Girl Scouts of Northern New Jersey at its annual Women of Achievement fundraising gala in September. She is senior vice president and chief human resources officer of Atlantic Health System.

Under her leadership, Atlantic Health System was honored for the 12th consecutive year as one of Fortune’s 100 Best Companies to Work For. She earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from UNC Charlotte.

2000s Jonathan Almond ’06 was promoted to district manager at Arborguard Tree Specialists. Almond is an ISA Board Certified Master Arborist, ISA Certified Tree

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Kaylor Jones

Jana Kaylor ’05 was named the 2020 Wilmer Jenkins Teacher of the Year by the Rotary Club of Hickory. Kaylor is a digital teaching and media facilitator at Oakwood Elementary School. She earned a bachelor’s degree in elementary education from UNC Charlotte.

Shawn Kimble ’07 was appointed head of U.S. capital markets for Barings. He will handle all debt activities and work closely with portfolio managers across various businesses to manage strategic financing needs.

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Alan Jones ’10 is the 2020 SEC Faculty Achievement Award recipient for the University of Mississippi, where he is chair and professor of emergency medicine at the University of Mississippi Medical Center.

Jones’ research interests include sepsis, life-threatening infections and critical care. He graduated from the UM School of Medicine and completed a residency in emergency medicine and a clinical trials research fellowship at Carolinas Medical Center. He earned a master’s degree in public health from UNC Charlotte.

Quigley

Alex Quigley ’14 was promoted to sergeant for the Kannapolis Police Department. Quigley is a certified polygraph examiner, field training officer and hostage negotiator. He earned a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from UNC Charlotte.

Jessica Rivas ’13 was named principal at HanfordDole Elementary School.

Previously, she served as an assistant principal at Monroe High School. She earned a bachelor’s degree in child

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Rivas

and family development and special education from UNC Charlotte.

Sadler-Sherrill

earned a master’s degree in school administration from UNC Charlotte.

Josh Weese ’13 was named principal of Conover School.

Previously, he was assistant principal at Newton-Conover High School. He received a master’s degree in history from UNC Charlotte.

Robertson

Grayson Robertson ’19 has joined Butler + Burke LLP as an associate accountant.

Butler + Burke is a full-service public accounting firm in Winston-Salem specializing in financial reporting and assurance services, tax compliance, tax planning, retirement and education planning and business consulting. Robertson received a bachelor’s degree in accounting from UNC Charlotte.

Nala Sadler-Sherrill ’15 was named assistant principal at Viewmont Elementary School. She previously served as principal at Northview Middle School.

Her experience with literacy education resulted in her classroom serving as a “model classroom” for balanced literacy in Gaston County. She

2020s

White

Jordan White ’20 was named athletics director at Freedom High School in Morganton for the 2020-21 school year.

He also will serve as an assistant principal. White received a master’s degree in school administration from UNC Charlotte.

If you’re a proud 49er alum and have exciting news, we want to know.

Join the Alumni Association’s online community to submit news and to stay engaged with the University by visiting 49erAlumni.uncc.edu.

Additionally, you can submit news via email to 49erAlumni@uncc.edu.

Accompanying photos are encouraged.

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Kat Lawrence

A Teacher in the Making

BY JENNIFER HOWE

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manda Mills has dreamed about being a teacher since she was a little girl. However, she didn’t know she wanted to work in special education until she was 13, when her nephew was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder. She witnessed how efforts by an applied behavior analyst therapist changed his life.

“He had communication skills we thought he might never have, and my sister had the tools to help her son thrive,” said Mills. “I knew then that I wanted to work in the field of special education. I have a passion for helping others, and I love kids.”

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Mills selected UNC Charlotte because of the outstanding academic reputation of the special education program offered through the Cato College of Education.

“I was excited to go to a university that I believed would set me up for success as a future teacher,” she said.

It also helped that her older sister had graduated from UNC Charlotte and was beginning her graduate program.

“It was fun commuting together and meeting up on campus during our breaks,” she said.

Shortly after beginning her UNC Charlotte studies, Mills learned she was pregnant. She questioned being able to afford school and support her son on a single income.

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“RECEIVING THE EVERGREEN SCHOLARSHIP IN HONOR OF WIL LOESEL WAS A CONFIRMATION THAT I AM EXACTLY WHERE I NEED TO BE. IT WAS SUCH A HUGE HONOR AND BLESSING TO BE CHOSEN.” —AM AN DA M I L L S

However, her call to teach fueled her determination to make her dream come true despite the challenges she faced.

“I have had such supportive classmates, professors and friends who have helped me at UNC Charlotte, and it has been an amazing experience,” said Mills.

Last spring, Mills received a life-changing email.

She was chosen to receive an Evergreen Scholarship in honor of UNC Charlotte alumnus Wil Loesel ’18, a Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools middle school math teacher diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in March 2020.

“Receiving the Evergreen Scholarship in honor of Wil Loesel was a confirmation that I am exactly where I need to be,” said Mills. “It was such a huge honor and blessing to be chosen. I have read Wil’s story and am amazed at his dedication to teaching and helping the kids in his community. I aspire to be that kind of teacher.”

The scholarship is covering her unmet financial need for her senior year, and Mills realized challenges she endured earlier in her life were for a good reason.

Leaving an abusive marriage that, at times, resulted in deep depression and thoughts of suicide, Mills pressed on to obtain an associate degree from a community college. She transferred to UNC Charlotte, still focused on achieving her goal of becoming a teacher.

“God gave me the strength to fight through the struggle, and I feel extremely blessed to be here today,” said Mills. “I can now look back and see how I have grown as a person and where my struggles have taken me — right here to being a senior at UNC Charlotte and being the recipient of such an amazing gift.”

The Evergreen Fund was established in 2015 as an initiative of the Division of Academic Affairs to support the most pressing student needs identified by the Enrollment Management Office. Evergreen Scholarships have been awarded to a diverse population of undergraduate, degree-seeking students based on financial need, academic achievement or other criteria that prioritize recruitment and retention. Evergreen Scholarships also are awarded to UNC Charlotte students who are close to degree completion and require a small amount of financial assistance to graduate.

Earlier this year, as Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools adopted remote learning for students due to COVID-19, teacher Wil Loesel ’18 continued to instruct students from his hospital room; he was being treated for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. His dedication inspired the creation of an Evergreen Scholarship in his honor.

Jennifer Howe is director of Advancement Communications.

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EPIC Building named for alumni Craig and Darla Albert

Ryan Honeyman

EPIC is a highly collaborative industry/education partnership that produces a technical workforce and advancements in technology for the global energy industry while supporting the Carolinas’ multi-state economic and energy security.

BY JENNIFER HOWE

U

NC Charlotte has named the EPIC building the Albert & Freeman Energy Production and Infrastructure Center to recognize and honor alumni Craig and Darla Albert. The naming took place during a virtual ceremony in October.

“We are proud to celebrate and recognize alumni Craig and Darla Albert for their unwavering support of our University,” said Chancellor Sharon L. Gaber.

“Their leadership and support of The William States Lee College of Engineering enables us to take

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another huge stride in our ongoing efforts to recruit and support deserving students and talented faculty.”

The generosity of the Alberts, especially throughout Exponential: The Campaign for UNC Charlotte, established the Albert Engineering Leadership Scholars program and the Freeman Scholarship, both housed in the University’s Honors College. Exponential, which concluded on June 30, 2020, raised more than $218 million to enhance the experiences of UNC Charlotte students and faculty, while strengthening the University’s academic programs.

“The Albert Engineering Leadership Scholars Program and the Freeman Scholarship are having a

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Craig ‘85 and Darla ‘83 Albert, first row, right, are pictured with Albert Engineering Leadership Scholars who receive a four-year meritbased scholarship to support their becoming the next generation of engineering leaders.

transformational impact on our honors students,” said Malin Pereira, executive director of the Honors College. “Craig and Darla Albert’s thoughtful and generous support allows our students to dream and achieve beyond anything they ever imagined for themselves.”

The Albert Engineering Leadership Scholars Program invests in superior students who have demonstrated excellence in the areas of academic achievement, leadership and community engagement.

Albert Scholars serve as the next generation of leaders who will make dynamic contributions to the field of engineering. The program offers students a full, four-year scholarship, along with academic support and the professional guidance necessary to achieve their educational and professional goals. There are currently 12 scholars in the program and four alumni.

The Freeman Scholarship provides renewable scholarship support to students pursuing any major who are eligible for one of the University’s honors programs. The Freeman Scholarship is open to incoming first-year students eligible for a Federal Pell Grant or other federal grant aid programs. The scholarship places a strong emphasis on commitment to academics. Currently six students have received a Freeman scholarship.

“Darla and I were honored when we learned that the UNC Charlotte Energy Production and Infrastructure Center building would bear our name,” said Craig Albert. “UNC Charlotte was integral in shaping and molding Darla and me

personally and professionally. We established the Albert Engineering Leadership Scholars Program and the Freeman Scholarship to provide current and future students with a world-class education, along with opportunities to develop into and emerge as influential community and industry leaders.”

Craig Albert earned a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the Lee College of Engineering in 1985 and currently serves as president and chief operating officer of Bechtel Group Inc., the largest engineering and construction firm in the United States. He is responsible for the management and oversight of the firm’s global operations and serves on the company’s board of directors. Darla Albert earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from UNC Charlotte’s Belk College of Business in 1983.

“This naming of the Energy Production and Infrastructure Center building recognizes and honors the kind generosity and tremendous passion the Albert family has for The William States Lee College of Engineering, especially our students,” said Rob Keynton, dean of the college. “It is a wonderful illustration of the importance for providing engineering students from various backgrounds with the proper training to become the future leaders for meeting the challenging and constantly evolving needs of industry.”

“UNC CHARLOTTE WAS INTEGRAL IN SHAPING AND MOLDING DARLA AND ME PERSONALLY AND PROFESSIONALLY.” — C RAI G AL BE RT ’85.

Jennifer Howe is director of Advancement Communications.

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Tesh Ramey ’10 established an Arts Education Endowment to fund an annual scholarship for a student pursuing K-12 licensure in art, music, dance or theater.

Ciara Lilly ’09 created a scholarship to complement the great work of the University Transition Opportunities Program.

An Exponential Impact

BY JENNIFER HOWE

T

hanks to the generosity of alumni, faculty, staff, friends and corporate partners, Exponential: The Campaign for UNC Charlotte concluded successfully, raising $218,220,737. The funds raised will enhance the experiences of UNC Charlotte students and faculty as well as strengthen academic programming.

More than 31,220 donors made gifts to the campaign that raised 109% of its goal, making it the most successful campaign in the University’s 74-year history.

Focusing on opportunity, resources, talent and impact, the campaign offered everyone — alumni, business leaders and the University community — the opportunity to shape a future for UNC Charlotte more exciting than its past.

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“I am proud of the thousands who supported this campaign,” said Gene Johnson ’73, chair of Exponential.

“Their tremendous demonstration of support, commitment and generosity ensure a brighter future for UNC Charlotte.”

The most significant beneficiaries of the campaign’s success are and will be the University’s students. More than 225 scholarships were created, allowing students to reduce their financial burden as they pursue their degrees. Seventy-five percent of UNC Charlotte students receive some type of financial aid, with an average unmet need of $9,275 per student, making scholarship support the University’s greatest area of opportunity.

Through the campaign 7,510 donors raised $71.3 million for student scholarships. As a result of Exponential, the average scholarship award increased 66.4%, from $1,751.93 to $2,916.54.

The power of scholarships

Donors who support UNC Charlotte do so for a variety of reasons. Alumni whose gifts created new scholarships were motivated to give back to their alma mater for the chance they’d had to fulfill their dreams of earning a UNC Charlotte degree.

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Dana Erato ’99, ’01, the beneficiary of a scholarship, created an endowed scholarship for the women’s soccer program. She was able to earn an undergraduate degree at UNC Charlotte, while serving as four-year captain of the inaugural women’s soccer team.

“I knew the only way I was going to be able to play Division 1 soccer while getting a stellar education was through a soccer scholarship,” said Erato. “UNC Charlotte gave me that wonderful gift, and I knew from the day I signed my scholarship papers that I wanted to do the same thing for another young soccer player one day.”

Chris Moxley ’03 believes that increasing opportunities for one person can increase longterm prospects for others, which is why he chose to create the Jaylen C. Moxley Scholarship for Academic Excellence.

The scholarship, named for his son, will provide support to incoming UNC Charlotte first-year students with demonstrated financial need, who also have a history of volunteerism in their local communities. Preference will be given to firstgeneration college students and applicants of the Charlotte Housing Authority Scholarship Fund.

“Jaylen inspires me every day, and I know that this scholarship, in his name, will be a stepping stone for countless others in the years to come

on their journeys to become the best versions of themselves,” said Moxley, a compliance officer with TIAA and co-founder of Charlotte’s successful apparel company, 704 Shop.

Ciara Lilly ’09 connected with the mission of the University Transition Opportunities Program (UTOP) as a student and now, as an alumna, created a scholarship to complement the opportunities UTOP provides.

“Going to college can be a difficult transition for many students, especially first-generation students that aren’t necessarily equipped with a blueprint for what the college experience should be like,” said Lilly, director of business development and diversity for Environmental Service Systems and founder of Higher Ground Consulting Group.

“UTOP gives students that blueprint, while empowering them to excel and connecting them to a strong support network, accessible throughout their collegiate journey.”

Tesh Ramey ’10, arts education specialist in the College of Arts + Architecture, graduated from college debt-free, thanks to her father, which allowed her to pursue a career as a K-12 music educator. But Ramey knows few students have that same luxury. That is why she established an Arts Education Endowment to fund an annual Fall 2020

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“I AM PROUD OF THE THOUSANDS WHO SUPPORTED THIS CAMPAIGN. THEIR TREMENDOUS DEMONSTRATION OF SUPPORT, COMMITMENT AND GENEROSITY ENSURE A BRIGHTER FUTURE FOR UNC CHARLOTTE.” — G E N E J O H NSON ’73, C H AI R O F E X PO NE NTI AL

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Kira Marsh ’22 receives her Duke Energy STEM Scholarship.

scholarship for a student pursuing K-12 licensure in art, music, dance or theater.

“My hope is these funds will support students earning licensure in the arts so they may begin their teaching careers free of debt,” said Ramey. “There is no better way to improve the world around you than to help someone be the first in their family to earn a degree, and on top of that, become a teacher.”

Scholarships transforming lives

Scholarships have made a difference in the lives of countless UNC Charlotte students.

They have enabled students to start, continue and finish their educational journeys at UNC Charlotte, while paving the way for successful futures.

DeVante Thomas-Pittman ’19 and Kendra Shaw ’19 were the first recipients of the Harper-Thomas Legacy Endowment for Study Abroad, which honors emeritus professors Herman Thomas and the late Mary Harper. The annual merit-based award supports students’ international educational experiences with preference given to selfidentified first-generation college students from underrepresented populations.

“The scholarship allowed me to enjoy a life-changing experience,” said ThomasPittman. “I know for a fact that I would not 72 UNC CHARLOTTE magazine

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Professor Emeritus Herman Thomas congratulates DeVante ThomasPittman ’19 and Kendra Shaw ’19 for being the first recipients of the Harper-Thomas Legacy Endowment.

have been able to study in Lyon, France, without the financial help. My classes at the University of Lyon were beneficial in helping me to better my comprehension of the French language. I was able to enjoy a handson learning environment and apply all of the skills I learned at UNC Charlotte.”

Evan West ’22 and Kira Marsh ’22 were co-valedictorians of the Charlotte Engineering Early College’s (CEEC) first graduating class of fifth-year students in 2019 and are continuing their educational journey at UNC Charlotte, thanks to generous scholarships from the Duke Energy Foundation.

“Receiving the Duke Energy STEM Scholarship means that I have far less of a financial burden weighing on me while I’m pursuing my degree,” said West, who is majoring in computer science.

For Marsh, receiving the annual $7,500 scholarship while she completes a bachelor’s degree in chemistry validates her CEEC efforts.

“I’m now able to learn what I want and do the best I can without having that financial burden on my back,” she said.

CEEC is an innovative partnership between Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools and UNC Charlotte, started in 2014, to attract high school students interested in STEM education, with a specific emphasis

on engineering. As part of the Duke Energy Foundation’s generous gift to Exponential, CEEC received $900,000 to support summer bridge programs, summer research experiences and scholarships.

As a first generation college student, Demond Martin ’97 committed to study, service and campus leadership, in the process becoming student government president as a sophomore and meeting his future wife, Kia ’98. They created the Martin Scholars Program to support high-achieving students with the highest level of financial need. The program provides students with opportunities for professional development through specialized programs and financial assistance in studying abroad or completing an internship.

“Being a Martin Scholar means having a group of peer scholars and mentors that will push you to have a bigger idea of what your future can be and then equip you to go out and achieve it,” said Marc Moore ’20.

“The scholarship itself also really helped me be able to fully focus on school and career without the constant financial fears many students face and helped me gain a strong undergraduate foundation to move forward with as I advance to grad school.”

Jennifer Howe is director of Advancement Communications.

NINERS, We’re Here to Help!

NINER BUSINESS NETWORK

The new Niner Business Network initiative can help connect you with fellow alumni in the business community. The Niner Business Network allows alumni-owned businesses to submit their information to the online business directory and encourages others to support their fellow Niners.

Niner Business Network members can also request to have a 49er alumni-owned business digital sticker added to their company’s website.

UNC CHARLOTTE CAREER SERVICES

UNC Charlotte’s Career Center offers virtual individual coaching sessions, small group discussions and just-in-time service.

Learn more about Niners Helping Niners at 49eralumni.uncc.edu

DIGITALLY CONNECT WITH ALUMNI

UNC Charlotte Alumni

@49erAlumni

UNC Charlotte Alumni Association 49erAlumni.uncc.edu 704-687-7799 • 800-745-8622

@49erAlumni

UNC Charlotte Alumni

Nonprofit Org. U.S. Postage PAID Charlotte, NC Permit No. 949

The University of North Carolina at Charlotte 9201 University Blvd.

Charlotte, NC 28223-0001

Kat Lawrence

Head football coach Will Healy and Norm the Niner reward a student for wearing a face covering on campus to help keep Niner Nation safe. Throughout the fall semester, the University’s educational campaign, “The New Norm: Your Health. Our Community,” promoted new safety standards designed to protect the campus.