History of the Board of Trustees

Edgecombe Technical Institute began as an extension unit of Wilson County Technical Institute and, in 1967, came under complete Edgecombe County administration, thus dissolving the relationship with Wilson County Technical Institute.

The Edgecombe County Board of Commissioners and the Boards of Education of Tarboro and Edgecombe County appointed a Board of Trustees. The first Board of Trustees comprised eight members:

  • Randolph D. Armstrong
  • Guy E. Barnes
  • Zebulon E. Brinson
  • Reginald M. Fountain
  • Thomas B. Grainger
  • Jonathan F. “Jack” Havens
  • David Phillips
  • Dr. Moses A. Ray

The final step to full institutional independence came in the spring of 1971 when the General Assembly made all technical institutes of North Carolina independent of any local boards of education and granted government by a twelve-member Board of Trustees. The Governor of North Carolina appointed four trustee members in July 1971, an action which completed the twelve-member Board.

The North Carolina General Assembly has since designated a thirteenth nonvoting member, the president of the Student Government Association.

Since the formation of the Edgecombe Community College Board of Trustees, fifty-five individuals have served as trustees. A number of these have served for twenty years or more:

  • Guy E. Barnes, 1968 – 1992 (24 years)
  • Jonathan K. Felton, 1970 – 2013 (43 years)
  • Thomas S. Fleming, 1971 – 2007 (36 years)
  • James H. Long, 1979 – 2016 (37 years)
  • Jessie M. Jones, 1981 – 2018 (37 years)
  • James I. Taylor, 1983 – 2019 (36 years)
  • Jean M. Bailey, 1992 – 2015 (23 years)
  • Helen W. Collins, 1993 – 2015 (22 years)
  • Gladys C. Shelton, 1994 – 2014 (20 years)
  • Jerry W. Spruell, 1994 – 1998, 2000 – Present (27 years and counting)
  • Bernice M. Pitt, 1996 – 2016 (20 years)
  • Gloria Wiggins-Hicks, 1997 – Present (26 years and counting)