Background: Native of Greenwood who received her bachelor’s degree in English and secondary education from Lander University. Before joining the College of Engineering and Information Technology in January 1988 she worked for Wal-Mart in Arkansas in the firm’s data processing area. She also attended USC as a non-degree seeking graduate student.

Tell us about your job. Our office handles student advisement and registration. We also counsel students experiencing academic difficulties, do room scheduling for classes, student organizations and functions, take part in the orientation process, and handle undergraduate degree certifications. The office is responsible for administering the SCAMP Program (S.C. Alliance for Minority Participation) and generally does whatever it can for our students, even things like calling the campus police to help them when they get locked out of their cars. I maintain statistics for the college in enrollment, graduation rates, and also coordinate the college scholarship program.

How many students are we talking about? Approximately 1,300 undergraduates in the fall semester. We have a staff of four people in the office and we stay pretty busy, even during the summer.

What’s the best part of your job? Working with the students. Since I handle the college’s scholarships, I get to work with a lot of really bright and promising students and that’s always a joy. The students are why we’re here and we enjoy helping them as much as we can.

What’s the most unusual request you’ve ever gotten from students? It might be the help they ask for when they come in looking for their cars after the vehicles have been towed from the Sonic parking lot. But we also bandage skinned knees from bike accidents and do other handholding when necessary.

What’s your take on the importance of private support for financial assistance to University students? It’s very important. With the rising cost of tuition, fees, and other expenses, financial aid can make a big difference in whether we’re able to recruit good quality students who are going to be successful in our college.

How would you describe the psychological income from your job? It’s in the importance of what we do for our student population. If we’re supportive of them, they’ll be supportive of us in the future. Our graduates give the college good word-of-mouth advertising. We do a lot of repeat business, and I think it’s because a lot of our students feel they get a good education here.

What do you do to decompress when you’re not at work? I have four children and six grandchildren, so I spend most of my off time doing family things. I also like to read and do craft activities like needlework.

What are your hopes for the future? One is that someone will establish a scholarship in the name of Elmer Schwartz, the college’s long-time associate dean, who died earlier this year. He was very interested in his students, in rewarding their academic efforts, and in making sure they were successful. I hope one day, too, that students who have been helped in reaching their academic goals by receiving a scholarship from our college will make it possible for future deserving students to benefit from this opportunity, as well.

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