Coming Home

Posted on Sept. 3, 1982

From the University Report (published by the GAA 1970-94)

It has been over a dozen years since I last lived in Chapel Hill, but in so many ways it seems that it was just yesterday. Perhaps that is what is so special about the experience that each of us had here whether we were students for a day or for a lifetime at this First State University.

I am amazed at how much change has taken place during the intervening years. And, yet, I am also amazed at how much has remained the same. Change is all around. It is reflected in the student body. It is reflected in the landscape. It is reflected in the buildings. And, I suspect. if I were to sit in a classroom or two, I would find change there as well.

But the special qualities that each of us cherished as students remain. One can easily be overwhelmed by the genuine love that people have for the campus, for the town of Chapel Hill, and for the excellence embodied throughout the University. We are rightfully proud of the national recognition we have earned not just on the athletic field but in research and teaching as well. After spending the last several years on Capitol Hill, I am again struck by the beauty and pace of the University. There is a genuine friendliness here reflected among all people, whether they be merchant, administrator, student, or faculty member. People take time to say “hello.” When they ask” how are you,” they want to know and they expect you to tell them.

GREATEST HONOR — Coming back to Chapel Hill as Director of Alumni Affairs will bring great challenge and is a real honor. I am grateful to Chancellor Fordham and the Officers and Board of Directors of the General Alumni Association for their faith and support. Perhaps Mrs. Albert Coates said it best when she remarked to me during my first week here that “the greatest honor a University can bestow to an alumnus is to ask him or her to return.”

I return with much hope and many expectations, for you see this University gave me far more than I could ever repay. I was but 17 when my father was killed in action in Vietnam. He was a professional military man, and our family had lived around the country and in Europe. When Dad died we decided to stay in Fayetteville. It was a unanimous decision and one that we have never regretted. We found a home in Fayetteville, and later a home here at the University. From 1966-1981 four of the five Dibbert boys (there were no Dibbert women beyond my mother) attended the University, and we all graduated! The one who went astray was determined to go through Army ROTC and for that reason went to NC State. I was fortunate to be the first of my brothers to come to Chapel Hill because I have been able to share in their education as well.

But it was not out of nostalgia that I made the decision to come home again. Life in Washington, D.C., and work on Capitol Hill were exciting and rewarding. As the senior aide to a US Senator, I was directly involved in developing public policy on many national and international issues. I firmly believe that the years ahead as Director of GAA will be every bit as exciting and as challenging.

TOUGH ACT — There is much that your Alumni Association has accomplished over the years. Clarence Whitefield gave distinguished leadership as Director and left a strong and vital organization. He will be a tough act to follow. Fortunately, he is still around and will be developing a much needed information system for the University. Thus, we can continue to seek his counsel and advice.

There is more that we can do. I come with some fresh thoughts and new ideas, but I know that to succeed I will need your help. This Alumni Association exists to serve you. I hope that those of you who have enjoyed membership in the Association will help me direct its efforts to meet the needs of our ever changing alumni body. We have an increasingly younger and a constantly growing alumni body. Soon half of our alumni will be living outside of North Carolina. The Alumni Association wants to reflect these changes while preserving those special qualities we all cherish.

It is my hope that we will soon be able to offer more variety in our programming for local chapters. We are now exploring and hope to have ready by next summer a family camp where alumni with their families can come for a vacation with recreational and continuing education opportunities. We have begun work on a new slide show with Charles Kuralt as our narrator. We expect this show to reflect the same high quality found in our earlier production — “Hark the Sound,” narrated by Andy Griffith. We will be providing more continuing education opportunities for those who want to come back to Chapel Hill and enjoy a taste of campus life with no exams and no grades. We will be visiting more of our Alumni Chapters and will continue to provide the kind of richness in programming for which this First State University is noted.

TO MAINTAIN SUPREMACY — The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is facing difficult days. The fiscal crisis that has hit at the federal and state level is threatening higher education all across the country. The University is one of, if not the, state’s greatest resources. Its excellence is widely recognized. However, its supremacy cannot be maintained without constant nurturing and unyielding support. That support can and must come in many forms. Certainly the University will always need private gifts. It also needs a continuing flow of new thoughts and ideas, a willingness by its alumni to come to its defense, to become advocates in the community, and to tell the Carolina story. We recognize that you cannot do that without having the tools with which to take on that assignment. We hope to use the Alumni publications to provide that message.

I look forward to meeting you in the coming weeks and months. I intend to travel to each of our chapters, and I hope you will visit me here at the Alumni House when you are in Chapel Hill. Please call whenever you want to express a thought, a suggestion, and, yes, even a criticism or two.

I am excited about sharing this experience with my wife, Debbie, and our young son, Michael. We will grow together as an alumni family. I have left Capitol Hill. I am cured of “Potomac fever” and renewed by “Tar Heel” fever. I have come home to Chapel Hill and look forward to a long and fruitful stay.

Yours at Carolina,

 

 

 

Douglas S. Dibbert ’70