State Senator, Student to Speak at VGCC Graduation
N.C. Senator Douglas E. Berger will be the principal commencement speaker for Vance-Granville Community College’s summer graduation exercises on Wednesday, August 8. Meanwhile, Carolyn C. Slade of Norlina, the incoming president of the college’s chapter of the Phi Theta Kappa honor society, will serve as the student speaker. Ceremonies are set to begin at 6 p.m. in the Civic Center on Main Campus.
Sen. Berger grew up in Smithfield, North Carolina. He graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and taught social studies in Kinston before returning to UNC for law school. Following admittance to the North Carolina State Bar, Sen. Berger served as an assistant district attorney in Johnston County as well as in the 9thJudicial District, made up of Franklin, Granville, Vance and Warren counties. Today, he represents those same four counties in the state legislature.
Sen. Berger was previously a Deputy Commissioner (judge) with the North Carolina Industrial Commission, hearing cases involving Workers’ Compensation issues. Since being elected to the North Carolina Senate, he has been employed with the James Scott Farrin Law Firm.
Sen. Berger is currently serving his second term in the North Carolina Senate. There, he has served on the Appropriations/Base Budget Committee, Appropriations Committee on Health and Human Services (Co-Chairman), the Judiciary II Committee (Co-Chairman), the Education/Higher Education Committee, the Commerce Committee, the Health Care Committee, the State and Local Government Committee, and the Select Committee on Government and Election Reform. He is Co-Chairman of the ONE NC Committee.
Sen. Berger lives in Youngsville with his wife, Annie Berger, a supervisor for Deaf and Hearing Impaired Services for Wake County Schools. He is the father of two and the grandfather of one.
Student speaker Carolyn C. Slade of Norlina will be graduating with a diploma from the Medical Assisting program, and she plans to return to VGCC and complete the associate’s degree in Medical Assisting as well. Slade is president of VGCC’s chapter of the Phi Theta Kappa honor society for the 2007-08 year. She also served as Parliamentarian for the Student Government Association during the 2006-07 year, and she has been vice-president of VGCC’s Student chapter of the Association of Medical Assistants.
Slade has served in the U.S. Air Force and has worked in supervisory roles in several businesses. She has tutored in the Vance and Warren County school systems and has taught basic adult literacy in Rockingham County. She is a volunteer counselor working with at-risk youth in Warren, Vance, Franklin and Granville counties.
Slade already has an Associate in Arts degree from Vance-Granville’s college transfer program and is a licensed Evangelist. Her long-range goals are to complete her associate’s degree in Medical Assisting in 2008, to become a registered nurse, to work in health care management and to receive a master’s degree in Divinity.
Students serving as marshals for Summer Graduation will be Adrian E. Davis and Faye B. Orr, both of Henderson; Kati Brantley Ayotte and Tina Williams Holden, both of Louisburg; Dawn Mathews Tom and John Williamson, both of Oxford; and Nichelle L. Taylor of Wake Forest.
