Opinion

Editorial: C.D. Spangler's priorities need to be emulated today

Friday, July 27, 2018 -- C.D. Spangler's life, most particularly the 11 years of it he spent as president of the UNC system, offers those who serve that system today with the critical qualifications and priorities for successful service.

Posted Updated
C.D. Spangler
CBC Editorial: Friday, July 27, 2018; Editorial #8327
The following is the opinion of Capitol Broadcasting Company

C.D. Spangler’s life, most particularly the 11 years of it he spent as president of the University of North Carolina system, offers those who serve that system today with the critical qualifications and priorities for successful service.

He lived and believed that:

  • Public education is THE key to improving the lives of all citizens and making North Carolina a better place to live.
  • ALL North Carolinians must have REAL access to higher education.
  • Service to the state came from his love of North Carolina and all of the people in it.

The current Board of Governors and system president would do well to make those their primary priorities to emulate.

It wasn't an easy task for Spangler, who died Sunday, to take over leadership of a university system that had been nurtured and raised for 30 years by Bill Friday, an iconic figure in the state and in higher education globally.

More so, Spangler didn't need the work. He was one of the wealthiest people in the nation. Why would he want: a government job; to deal with a board of governors not of his choosing; to wrangle with 180 state legislators who controlled his budget and believed they knew best how to run things; to oversee 17 campuses with 225,000 students along with 44,000 faculty and staff spread across every region of the state?

He did it because it was in his soul to uplift others.

At a time when many responsible community leaders worked to denigrate public education, Spangler sent his children to public schools in Charlotte and served on the local board of education. It was amid the 1970s turmoil over busing students to support integration and he worked to bring a very divided community together and improve the quality of its schools.

Gov. Jim Hunt appointed Spangler Chairman of the state Board of Education, where he served from 1982 to 1986, fostering significant statewide improvements in education quality and teacher pay.

Spangler would say leading the UNC system was the best job in the world, recalled Wyndham Robertson, who was the system’s first female vice president. It was Spangler who convinced Robertson, a Salisbury native, to leave her job as a publishing executive in New York City to work for the university system.

Spangler was relentless in insisting that the state's public universities be accessible and honor the words in the State Constitution that they "as far as practicable, be extended to the people of the State free of expense."
Even the slightest rumor of a hint that a tuition increase was possible would send him, personally, to the legislature to deliver a firm message of opposition. "The argument to raise tuition comes from a small group of very wealthy people who think they know something about running a business. But they don’t know much about the economic status of the families of North Carolina," Spangler said in a 1996 newspaper interview.
While Spangler demanded a salary commensurate with the responsibility of the job, he returned it back, using the money to endow professorships. His family foundation helped fund 120 professorships throughout the 16 UNC campuses.

During his tenure the UNC system instituted minimum admissions standards and other intercollegiate athletic reforms – some growing out of the 1989 scandal involving academic abuses connected with N.C. State University’s basketball program.

Spangler also made a point to connect with students. His habit of taking lunch at the Lenoir dining hall on the UNC-Chapel Hill campus inspired the staff there to name a salad in his honor.

His involvement with higher education wasn't limited to UNC. He received a degree from Harvard University’s Business School and subsequently was a major benefactor to the university and serving on its Board of Overseers – including a year as president.

In 1986, many focused on the expectation that Spangler would bring a nuts-and-bolts business sense to leadership of the state's universities. North Carolina was fortunate to get much more.

His legacy demonstrates for leaders now and those in generations to come, that it is good business to love your state. And that an accessible high-quality public education is the key to uplifting all of its citizens.

Related Topics

Copyright 2024 by Capitol Broadcasting Company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.