Amazing Grace

The A-B Tech Foundation has received its largest donation ever - almost three quarters of a million dollars- from the estate of the late Grace Love Schneider, an Asheville native who passed away in 1999.

She included the college in her will after, at the age of 85, taking an A-B Tech-sponsored Lecture Series entitled "100 Decisive Points in History," offered by historian David Carey in 1986. (See related story below)

Carey, 89, said he is proud that his lecture series was the impetus for the donation, which will help many students at A-B Tech. "That's going on my tombstone," he said.

The gift - totalling just over $730,000 - to the A-B Tech Foundation has been routed to the Grace Love Schneider Endowed Scholarship Fund, which offers $1,200 to qualified full-time students in any field of study who are residents of Buncombe or Madison counties .

Carey Lecture Leads to Record Gift

David Carey gets ready to fire one off in one of his many tennis games. The 89-year-old presented a lecture series that caught the attention of A-B Tech benefactor Grace Love Schneider. She credited his series and A-B Tech's sponsorship of it with her decision to leave one-third of her estate to A-B Tech.

His name is David Carey. He is the kind of man a prime minister would invite to dinner to discuss his country's dilemma on trade deficits, an entrepreneur would seek advice from on economic trends or PBS would enlist for a television series on the 100 decisive points in history.

A think-tanker from the Washington Center for Strategic and International Studies would love to pick his brain.

Larger than life, the Asheville retiree didn't even have time to finish schooling at Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar. He was too busy bringing world peace after World War II, rebuilding Europe and Asia - with an international agency which reported to Douglas MacArthur in Japan under the Marshall Plan in Europe for 20 years. The political economist, now 89 and an avid tennis champion, also worked as a national mediation consultant to settle union strikes.

A recently published report by the Washington Center for Strategic and International Studies remarked on Carey's and the agency's work as being mainly responsible for the post-war Franco-German Accord after World War II. "This astonishingly rapid accord is one of the greatest achievements in the entire record of modern statecraft."

His latest coup? His lecture series on the 100 Decisive Points in History sponsored by A-B Tech became the impetus for the largest donation ever to the college's Foundation.

"When I first moved here in 1983, I was looking for something to do. I started taking extension courses ... one on curry cooking and I had the idea ... what about doing something on the 100 Decisive Points in History?" Carey said. The lecture series gained regional and national recognition. "It was very successful. PBS approached me to do a TV series. And I got calls from all over to do the lecture series."

At Carey's lecture series at Highland Farms in Black Mountain in 1986, a woman named Grace Joan Love Schneider was in the audience. Schneider enjoyed the A-B Tech sponsored series so much that when she passed away in 1999, she left a third of her estate - close to $750,000 - to the A-B Tech Foundation. "President Bailey told me it said in her will that she left a third of her estate to A-B Tech because she so much enjoyed my lecture series and they sponsored it." Carey smiles,then offers a hearty chuckle as he says: "That's going on my tombstone."

Carey was born in Malaysia, the "first white child born on the island" and was sent to boarding school in England when he was only six. Travel took weeks by boat so he was limited to family visits spanning every three years. His family was in the rubber business at a time when cars were just being invented. Although Carey played rugby and cricket in his youth, he never picked up tennis until after he retired at age 65. He held the title of world champion for his age group three years ago, beating a former Wimbledon winner who regained the honor the following year.

He has held more than 30 world, national, state and local tennis championship titles in his age group, including European Open, the International Tennis Federation doubles, 20 Asheville open titles, seven N.C. championships and six national tournament wins. Carey, who just returned from winning nationals in singles and doubles in Palm Beach, Calif., is being inducted into the WNC Sports Hall of Fame during a May ceremony.

The retiree is active in more than just tennis. Carey is a founding board member of Asheville's Mediation Center, a non-profit center for troubled adults with trained mediators who work an average of 150 cases a month - some court appointed. The Center has also launched a "Fussbusters" program in the schools which has become a model for other systems. "One principal said that mediation has saved us 10 years of suspension time already," Carey said.

"In my middle 70s I was looking around for something to do and so I called up Oxford to see if I could finish my scholarship but they wouldn't take me back," Carey says with a laugh.

President Bailey Meets With NC Legislators

President K. Ray Bailey addresses members of the North Carolina General Assembly during a legislative weekend sponsored by the Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce in April. President Bailey talked about the college's growth, its community partnerships, and its superior rating on the state's Performance Measures. He also thanked legislators for their support of community colleges and urged them to provide enrollment growth funding, salary increases for faculty and staff, and equipment funding for the next fiscal year.

President Bailey, Corporate and Economic Development Help Land New Company

Employees of American DataMed train at A-B Tech's Enka Campus.

The dealmaker. That's how the Asheville Citizen-Times recently described the efforts of President K. Ray Bailey and the college's Corporate and Economic Development staff to bring a new company to Asheville. In an April 4 editorial, the Citizen-Times said President Bailey's offer to train American DataMed workers at no cost sealed the deal for Asheville over 15 other cities. Training began in April at the college's Enka Campus.

DataMed digitizes images, documents and medical records for instant Web-based retrieval. Its new national customer service center in Asheville will mean 100 jobs for the area over the next two years. President and CEO Ron Hubbard said the company also may move its accounting and billing, which could mean 200 to 300 jobs in the next 24 to 36 months.

The Citizen-Times said A-B Tech's ability to provide free, customized training to companies such as DataMed "gives the area something a lot of other communities lack in today's wildly competitive business environment - an edge."

Book Battle

Nancy Larkin, Chair of the Regional Battle of the Books Committee, expressed her thanks to Vice President of Instructional Services Sharon Morrissey for a wonderful competition held on the A-B Tech campus. This competition pits teams of middle schoolers against one another in a "quiz bowl" setting pertaining to recently read books.

Keynote Technote

President Bailey was the keynote speaker for the North Carolina Association of Community College Facility Operations 10-year anniversary celebration.

Lonon Chosen As "Community College Connector"

Deborah Lonon, Team Leader of the Quality Enhancement Plan at A-B Tech, has been named an International Alliance for Invitational Education "Community College Connector." The IAIE is made up of 1,200 professionals representing 12 countries who seek to apply the concepts of invitational education to their personal and professional lives. Ê As IAIE Connector, Deborah will provide information on how Invitational Education may enhance a community college's learning environment to any community college in North America requesting that information.

Return to top