Gardner Webb University - Web / Anchor Yearbook (Boiling Springs, NC)

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vji. :ro ' B ' erd £. KNoaa Vice President, TLcademie Dean A.. Q. What kind of changes do you foresee at Gardner-Webb in the 80 ' s? A. 1 see a gradual change coming in the student body toward a wider range in the age of the students. There will be fewer younger students and more older students will come to complete a degree. This will cause the college programs to diversify by starting with where the student is and broadening his horizon. Different curriculum will be developed to meet the needs of the older students which will include graduate programs. Also as Gardner- Webb grows up as a senior college, the academic requirements will increase. Q. What are the daily administrative duties of the Academic Dean? A. Working with the academic program, first by meeting with students who have problems. Also, I like to teach and I try to teach a course each semester. To summarize, I try to have a sense of where we are and where it would be good for us to go in order to organize our efforts to get there, and to give every person enough room to find their own way to achieve those goals. 1 do reahze that as a community, we have to have some goals in common to hold us together. Q. How do you personally handle the pressures of your position as Academic Dean? A. It is important that 1 keep outside interests going; I tend to be an athletic person, and I find alot of satisfaction in outside activities. Personally, I like the activities that are very competitive, that allow me to lose myself, like basketball. I also like the activities that allow me to be alone to think. I also love to be with my family, to see them grow. I enjoy spending time with them, it gets my mind off my work. Q. What are your goals and what motivates you to realize these goals? A. I am personally and professionally an educator. I deeply believe in the goodness of education, but I also know its limitations. You can teach someone what is morally good, and that does not make them a morally good person. Learning does change one ' s outlook on life. Personally, my goals are better understanding myself so that I make better contributions to others. Q. In order of importance, what are your personal and professional priorities? A. 1 continue to place a priority on trying to better understand my children. 1 want to be informed about what they want and need, which are not always the same thing. 1 try to be gentle, helpful, and constructive with them — the same in being a husband, trying to treat my wife the same way. I want to learn more about myself and others. Primarily, 1 put a high priority on trying to gain a sense of vision; what could we do that is special — here is a standard that others could look to and learn from. 19

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V% CJ VEN £. WI££17mS, Tresiknt Q. What attracted you to Gardner-Webb? A. In my own personal timetable, I felt like I was ready to accept a challenge. This was a North Carolina Baptist college and 1 am a North Carolina Baptist, so that obviously had a direct appeal to me. It was terribly important to me from a personal sense of responsibility to my family and to my career that I be placed at a college which had the basic ingredients to withstand the inflationary pressures of the 1980 ' s. Q. How would you characterize yourself? A. That ' s a very difficult question for me because 1 just don ' t find myself thinking about myself very much. 1 have thought about this college for 4 years and higher education for 15 years. I don ' t spend much time assessing myself. I think that one might say, based on personality and lifestyle, that I ' m a very intense person. 1 think that I ' m a competitive person. That has carried over into my daily work which suggests that I believe I have to make up with intensity, effort, and hustle what other people can do with natural talent. I would like to think that it ' s true that I am an open person. I would not want to think that anybody was afraid of me in any way though, inevitably, there may be some apprehensions about the office . Q. How would you like students to perceive you? A. There are times when I get terribly uncomfortable, times when I ' m alone and I realize I ' m dealing in futures. It ' s a very unsettling thought that there are 1450 people out there whose futures I may be affecting. That gives me a sense of real humility and sometimes apprehension. I hope that the students will believe the genuineness of my feeling that there ' s little else as important in life as serving their future developments through leadership of this college. Q. In order of importance what are your personal and professional priorities? A. For me, living is the church, my family, and Gardner-Webb College, and there are certain circumstances where one takes precedence over the other. Q. You are relatively young for such a prestigious position, what does the future hold for Dr. Craven Williams? A. I ' ve had other opportunities, even since I ' ve been here. As yet, 1 have not had any more interest than returning the call and saying, Not interested! Every bit of personal ambition that I now have is always involved with what I hope we can see happen for Gardner-Webb, especially To make our graduates as intensely sought after as any other graduates. My ambitions are ambitions for the college. It ' s a very peaceful kind of feeling, too. 18

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Taculty and TQminstration Robert W. Abrams Dir. Church Relations Randall L. Alexander Sports Information Dir. Dr. Garland H. Allen Religion, Golf Coach Mr. Joe Allen Business Dr. Charles 5- Andrews Chairman, Dept. of Foreign Languages Literature Ms. Michele Aina Barale English Dr. Gilmer W. Blackburn Associate Professor History Dr. Robert Blackburn Chairman, Health Education Physical Education Mr. Ernest M. Blakenship English, Language, Literature Mrs. Novella Blanton Assistant Business Manager Mr. Harold Gene Borders Superintendent of Buildings and Grounds Mr. Bruce Brown Assistant Professor Economics Dr Joyce C. Baown Associate Professor English Dr. Lesslie M. Brown Biology Mr. Jerry Zeb Bryson Physical Education Baseball Coach Dr. Barbara Burkett Biology 20