North Carolina Central University (NCCU or NC Central) is a
public
In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichkei ...
historically black university
Historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) are institutions of higher education in the United States that were established before the Civil Rights Act of 1964 with the intention of primarily serving the African-American community. Mo ...
in
Durham, North Carolina
Durham ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina and the county seat of Durham County, North Carolina, Durham County. Small portions of the city limits extend into Orange County, North Carolina, Orange County and Wake County, North Carol ...
. Founded by
James E. Shepard
James Edward Shepard (November 3, 1875 – October 6, 1947) was an American pharmacist, civil servant and educator, the founder of what became the North Carolina Central University in Durham, North Carolina. He first established it as a private sc ...
in affiliation with the
Chautauqua movement in 1909, it was supported by private funds from both Northern and Southern philanthropists. It was made part of the state system in 1923, when it first received state funding and was renamed as Durham State Normal School. It added graduate classes in arts and sciences and professional schools in law and library science in the late 1930s and 1940s.
In 1969 the legislature designated this a regional university and renamed it as North Carolina Central University. It has been part of the
University of North Carolina system since 1972 and offers programs at the
baccalaureate,
master's, professional, and
doctoral
A doctorate (from Latin ''docere'', "to teach"), doctor's degree (from Latin ''doctor'', "teacher"), or doctoral degree is an academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism ''li ...
levels. The university is a member of the
Thurgood Marshall College Fund
The Thurgood Marshall College Fund (TMCF) is an American non-profit organization that supports and represents nearly 300,000 students attending its 47 member-schools that include public historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), medic ...
.
History
North Carolina Central University was founded by
James E. Shepard
James Edward Shepard (November 3, 1875 – October 6, 1947) was an American pharmacist, civil servant and educator, the founder of what became the North Carolina Central University in Durham, North Carolina. He first established it as a private sc ...
as the National Religious Training School and Chautauqua for the Colored Race in the
Hayti District.
Chautauqua was an educational movement that originated in the Northeast. The school was chartered in 1909 as a private institution and opened on July 5, 1910.
Woodrow Wilson, the future U.S. president, contributed some private support for the school's founding.
The school was sold and reorganized in 1915, becoming the National Training School; it was supported by
Margaret Olivia Slocum Sage, a philanthropist of New York who was particularly concerned about education. (She founded the
Russell Sage Foundation
The Russell Sage Foundation is an American non-profit organisation established by Margaret Olivia Sage in 1907 for “the improvement of social and living conditions in the United States.” It was named after her recently deceased husband, rail ...
and made generous bequests to several schools.) The National Training School supported Black teacher development in the
Jim Crow
The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws enforcing racial segregation in the Southern United States. Other areas of the United States were affected by formal and informal policies of segregation as well, but many states outside the Sout ...
era, a time when Black education was underfunded by southern states at both the lower and upper levels.
![NCCU James E](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/NCCU_James_E._Shepard_statue.JPG)
Becoming a state-funded institution in 1923, this school was renamed as Durham State Normal School for Negroes; normal schools trained teachers for elementary grades. In 1925, reflecting the expansion of its programs to a four-year curriculum with a variety of majors, the General Assembly converted the institution into the North Carolina College for Negroes, dedicating it to the offering of liberal arts education and the preparation of teachers and principals of secondary schools. It was the nation's first state-supported liberal arts college for black students.
To avoid the state
Jim Crow
The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws enforcing racial segregation in the Southern United States. Other areas of the United States were affected by formal and informal policies of segregation as well, but many states outside the Sout ...
system of segregated passenger cars on trains, Shepard insisted on traveling to Raleigh by car to lobby the legislature.
The college's first four-year class graduated in 1929.
The college was accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools as an "A" class institution in 1937 and was admitted to membership in that association in 1957. Graduate courses in the School of Arts and Sciences were added in 1939, in the School of Law in 1940, and in the School of Library Science in 1941. In 1947, the General Assembly changed the name of the institution to North Carolina College at Durham.
On October 6, 1947, Shepard, the founder and president, died. He was succeeded in 1948 by
Alfonso Elder
Alfonso Elder (February 26, 1898 – August 1974) was the second president of North Carolina Central University.
On January 20, 1948, Elder was elected President of North Carolina College at Durham. At the time of his election, Elder was ser ...
. At the time of Elder's election he was serving as head of the Graduate Department of Education and had formerly been dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. Elder retired September 1, 1963.
Samuel P. Massie
Samuel Proctor Massie, Jr. (July 3, 1919 – April 10, 2005) was a chemist who studied a variety of chemicals that contributed towards the development of therapeutic drugs, including the chemistry of phenothiazine. As one of the African American ...
was appointed as the president on August 9, 1963, and resigned on February 1, 1966. On July 1, 1967,
Albert N. Whiting assumed the presidency. He served as president and chancellor of the institution. Among the significant developments during his service was the creation of NCCU School of Business. Programs in public administration and criminal justice were also launched. Whiting retired June 30, 1983.
The 1969 General Assembly designated the institution as one of the State's regional universities, and the name was changed to North Carolina Central University. Since 1972, NCCU has been a constituent institution of the
University of North Carolina system. On July 1, 1972, the state's four-year colleges and universities were joined to become The Consolidated University of North Carolina, with 16 individual campuses headed by a single president and governed by the University of North Carolina Board of Governors. However, each campus was led by a separate chancellor and a campus-specific board of trustees.
Whiting was succeeded by
LeRoy T. Walker as chancellor, followed by
Tyronza R. Richmond,
Julius L. Chambers
Julius LeVonne Chambers (October 6, 1936 – August 2, 2013) was an American lawyer, civil rights leader and educator.
Early life and education
Chambers grew up during the Jim Crow era in rural Montgomery County, North Carolina. As a child, Cham ...
(who had previously been director-counsel (chief executive) of the
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund),
James H. Ammons
James H. Ammons is an American educator, who is the Chancellor of Southern University at New Orleans. He served as president of Florida A&M University (FAMU) from July 2, 2007, until his resignation took effect on July 16, 2012. He is a native Flo ...
,
Charlie Nelms, and
Debra Saunders-White in 2013. Saunders-White was the first woman to hold the office on a permanent basis (Donna Benson was the first woman to serve as interim chancellor of the university). Saunders-White took a leave of absence in 2016, then provost,
Johnson O. Akinleye, was appointed as acting chancellor. Following her death in November 2016, Akinleye became interim chancellor.
Johnson O. Akinleye was elected as the 12th chancellor of NCCU on June 26, 2017. In this position, Akinleye has worked to expand the university's academic partnerships, including new agreements with community colleges, as well as introduced a robust online, distance-education program, NCCU Online. He also created K-12 initiatives and implemented a security strategy to increase safety for campus constituents.
Campus
The campus is located about a mile south of downtown
Durham, North Carolina
Durham ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina and the county seat of Durham County, North Carolina, Durham County. Small portions of the city limits extend into Orange County, North Carolina, Orange County and Wake County, North Carol ...
and about three miles east of
Duke University
Duke University is a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco and electric power industrialist James ...
. Eleven buildings built before 1940 are included in a national
historic district
A historic district or heritage district is a section of a city which contains older buildings considered valuable for historical or architectural reasons. In some countries or jurisdictions, historic districts receive legal protection from c ...
. All of the buildings, except for the three residences, are
Georgian Revival-style buildings; they have contemporary fireproof construction with steel trusses and brick exterior walls. They include the James E. Shepard Administration Building, Alexander Dunn Hall, Annie Day Shepard Hall, and five institutional buildings built in the late 1930s under the auspices of the
Public Works Administration
The Public Works Administration (PWA), part of the New Deal of 1933, was a large-scale public works construction agency in the United States headed by Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes. It was created by the National Industrial Recove ...
.
The campus was listed on the
National Register of Historic Places in 1986.
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]
Organization
NCCU is a part of the University of North Carolina (UNC) System. The campus is governed by a thirteen-member Board of Trustees: eight elected, four appointed, and the president of the Student Government Association also serves as an ex-officio member. The Board elects its officers annually and meets five times per year.
As of Fall 2020, NCCU had a total of 8,078 students, (full and part-time) including 6,067 undergraduate and 1,608 graduate students. Nearly 70% are women and 30% are men. 71.6% percent are Black, 9.7% are white, 6.6% are Hispanic and 1.3 Asian. As of 2020, NCCU had a student faculty ratio of 16:1.
Schools and colleges
*School of Business ( AACSB-accredited)
*School of Education
* School of Law
*School of Library & Information Sciences
* College of Health & Sciences
* College of Arts, Social Sciences & Humanities
* School of Graduate Studies
Research institutes
*The Julius L. Chambers Biomedical Biotechnology Research Institute (BBRI)
*Biomanufacturing Research Institute and Technology Enterprise (BRITE)
Additional programs
*University Honors Program
Honors colleges and honors programs are special accommodation constituent programs at public and private universities – and also public two-year institutions of higher learning – that include, among other things, supplemental or alternative ...
(UHP)
*NCCU Online
*Evening & Weekend Degree Programs
Student activities
Student organizations
North Carolina Central University has over 130 registered student organizations and 12 honor societies.
Student media
The students of North Carolina Central University publish the ''Campus Echo'', a bi-weekly newspaper that has been in publication since the school's founding in 1910. The ''Campus Echo'' contains articles covering local events, arts and entertainment, and sports among other topics.
Gallery
File:James E. Shepard.jpg, James E. Shepard
James Edward Shepard (November 3, 1875 – October 6, 1947) was an American pharmacist, civil servant and educator, the founder of what became the North Carolina Central University in Durham, North Carolina. He first established it as a private sc ...
, c. 1947, founder of the National Religious Training School and Chautauqua for the Colored Race
File:NCCU campus signage.JPG, North Carolina Central University entrance seen from S. Alston Avenue
File:NCCU Campus Drive.JPG, View of the NCCU campus seen from the James E. Shepard Administration Building
File:NCCU Student Center.jpg, The NCCU Student Center
Athletics
File:NCCU's O'Kelly-Riddick Stadium.JPG, NCCU's O'Kelly-Riddick Stadium home to the MEAC Division I FCS Eagles
File:NCCU track and soccer field.JPG, A view of the NCCU track, soccer field along with Richmond Residence Hall and the LeRoy T. Walker Physical Education Complex (far right)
NCCU sponsors fourteen men's and women's sports teams that participate in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I as a newly readmitted member of the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference. Athletic teams include football, softball, baseball, basketball, track and field, tennis, volleyball, bowling, and golf.
Notable alumni
References
External links
*
NCCU Athletics website
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Universities and colleges accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools
University and college buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in North Carolina
Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in North Carolina
Universities and colleges in Durham, North Carolina
Educational institutions established in 1910
1910 establishments in North Carolina
Public Works Administration in North Carolina
Georgian Revival architecture in North Carolina
Buildings and structures in Durham County, North Carolina
National Register of Historic Places in Durham County, North Carolina
Public universities and colleges in North Carolina
Historically black universities and colleges in the United States