Each Tuesday the D.J's Music Site HBCU Campaign Fund organization will highlight a HBCU Chancellor or President. This is in promotion of our social media campaign to bring awareness and recognition of the academic excellence that HBCU leadership produce as well as historically black colleges and universities.

This Tuesday (11/3/15), we highlighted Dr. Debra Saunders-White, (pictured on the right), President of North Carolina Central University.

Dr. Debra Saunders-White (Ed.D.), began as the 11th Chancellor of North Carolina Central University on June 1, 2013.

A Hampton, VA., native, Saunders-White earned her Bachelor's degree in history from the University of Virginia. She earned a master's of business administration from The College of William & Mary and a doctorate in higher education administration from The George Washington University.

Prior to Saunders-White NCCU appointment, she served as acting assistant secretary for the office of Postsecondary Education at the U.S. Department of Education. Saunders-White joined the Department of Education in May 2011 as the deputy assistant secretary for higher education programs.

Prior to entering higher education administration, Saunders-White spent 15 years in the corporate sector at IBM. From 1994 to 1998, Saunders-White taught college-preparatory mathematics at St. George's School in Newport, R.I. In 1999, she joined Hampton University as assistant provost for technology and she was promoted to the newly created post of vice president for technology and chief information officer in 2005.

Saunders-White left Hampton the following year to join the University of North Carolina Wilmington  (UNCW) as Vice Chancellor for Information Technology systems. From 2007 to 2008, she also served concurrently as UNCW's interim associate provost in the Office of Institutional Diversity and Inclusion and as chief diversity officer.

Saunders-White priorities for ensuring students success and academic excellence include: retaining and graduating students in four years; raising critical scholarship fund; and providing innovative academic instruction that prepares and trains students to work in the global marketplace.

Saunders-White is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. and a member of the Links Inc. She is the mother of two children, Elizabeth Paige and Cecil III.

#ChooseNCCU

For more information about North Carolina Central University, visit www.nccu.edu.