The UNC Charlotte Alumni Association honored eight individuals for embodying the core principles of the University and for distinguishing themselves through their outstanding service to UNC Charlotte, their chosen field and humanity.
The 2015 awards were presented at the Alumni Awards Banquet on Tuesday, March 17, at UNC Charlotte Center City.
“All of our awardees have achieved so much, both personally and professionally, in their lives, and we are proud to have them as a part of our 49er family,” said UNC Charlotte Alumni Association President Deborah Pittman.
“The nominee pool for this year’s awards was outstanding,” she added. “Choosing the honorees for each category was not an easy task. As graduates and members of the UNC Charlotte 49er family, we are proud to have eight superior honorees this year, each of who support our University as volunteers, advocates and donors.”
The honorees are recognized within five different distinctions:
Distinguished Faculty Award
Howard Godfrey, Ph.D.
If one were to ask Belk College Accounting alumni who they remember well or which faculty members they’ve kept in touch with after graduation, Howard Godfrey is invariably near the top of the list. With a genuine interest in students, loyalty to UNC Charlotte and a passion for the accounting profession, he has become a genuine Belk College institution.
Godfrey joined the UNC Charlotte faculty in 1975. He was the first business faculty member to hold a Ph.D. in accounting (from the University of Alabama) and the first certified public accountant in Charlotte with a doctoral degree. Godfrey has fond memories of faculty members from that era, particularly department chair and fellow awardee Tom Turner.
Teaching primarily in the area of federal taxation, Godfrey is a CPA in North Carolina and a member of the American Accounting Association, the American Taxation Association and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.
In 2011, he received the Bank of America Award for Teaching Excellence, and, in 2012, he received the UNC Board of Governors Award for Teaching Excellence.
Outstanding Young Alumnus Award
Fabian Elliott ’12
During his UNC Charlotte tenure, Fabian Elliott could be found just about anywhere on campus as he participated in a number of organizations. He founded the United Black Professionals, a collegiate affiliate of the National Black MBA Association. A student organization, United Black Professionals prepares students for future career endeavors.
A Belk College Dean’s Fellow, Elliott was crowned Homecoming King. He also holds the honor of being UNC Charlotte’s 100,000th graduate after earning a bachelor’s degree in marketing from the Belk College of Business in 2012.
In 2011, Elliott, then 21 years old, was chosen to intern with Google’s sales team. As a Google intern, his responsibilities included researching the team’s seven retail clients that made up a $61.8 million annual revenue account and performing a SWOT [Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats] analysis. He also examined marketing mixes in order to identify potential business opportunities.
Honorary Alumnus Award
Thomas Turner
Thomas “Tom” Turner, credited with almost single-handedly building the UNC Charlotte Accounting Department into a premiere program, is known as much for giving people a good-natured hard time as he is for teaching.
After many years in the private sector as a certified public accountant, Turner arrived at UNC Charlotte in 1966 – just one year after the institution became part of the UNC system. He was known as a tough teacher and insisted that a strong accounting program had to begin with strong teachers.
Turner also served on the professional ethics committee of the N.C. Association of Certified Public Accountants. He taught more than 2,000 accounting students in his day and had at least 19 graduates earn medals for outstanding performance on the CPA examination. That means those students ranked either first, second or third in the state.
Humanitarian Award
Lynn Dobson ’70, ’75
Throughout her career, Lynn Dobson has been involved in cancer care, hospice, youth ministry, therapeutic childcare programs, mission work and camps for special needs children.
Dobson earned her nursing degree at UNC Charlotte in 1970 and her Master of Education degree in 1975. She served as a clinical instructor in pediatric nursing at UNC Charlotte from 1973-91.
During this time, she was one of three faculty members who started the Nursing Clinic at the Salvation Army for Women and Children. In 1992, she was recognized for her work nationally as a recipient of the Jefferson Award, America’s highest public service honor that recognizes unsung heroes who volunteer to make life better for others.
Dobson’s experience as a three-time cancer survivor inspired her humanitarian efforts. One of her major accomplishments in Charlotte was the development and direction of Camp Care, a summer camp for children with cancer.
Alumni Hall of Fame Award (four recipients)
Robert Brame Jr., Ph.D. ’88, ’91
Robert “Bobby” Brame graduated cum laude from UNC Charlotte in 1986 with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and a Master of Science in Criminal Justice in 1991. He completed his Ph.D. in criminology and criminal justice in 1997 at the University of Maryland.
Upon graduation, he was awarded a prestigious postdoctoral research fellowship at the NationalConsortium on Violence Research at the Heinz School of Public Policy and Management at
Carnegie Mellon University. After completing the fellowship, he was invited to become a member of the consortium, a considerable honor as membership includes fewer than 90 scholars and is both international and multidisciplinary.
In addition, he was invited to be an associate for the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Network on Adolescent Development and Juvenile Justice.
A full professor at UNC Charlotte (2007-13), Brame is a distinguished professor in the University of South Carolina’s Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice, where he has helped to establish the department’s Ph.D. program.
Currently, Brame is considered one of the top criminologists in the nation. He has had a positive impact on his students, served as a mentor to fellow faculty members and significantly impacted the field of criminal justice and criminology.
S. Mark Doughton ’80
Doughton graduated with a degree in business administration in 1980 from the Belk College of Business. He began his career in 1985 with Inmar Inc., a Winston-Salem-based logistics and promotion services company. He helped to build the startup company into a powerful national company of more than 1,500 employees and 31 warehouses.
Currently, Doughton works as a career development consultant. He has provided generous financial support for many campus efforts, including the Center for Professional Development and the Mark and Susan Doughton Faculty Development Fund, as well as to the unrestricted Chancellor’s Fund.
He is the president of the UNC Charlotte Athletic Foundation Board and serves with the United Way of Forsyth County and on the Wake Forest Baptist Health-Comprehensive Cancer Center Regional Board.
Additionally, he is president of the Stephen Doughton Jr. Foundation for Leukemia Research,named in honor of his son. In May 2006, Stephen was diagnosed with Chronic Mylogenous Leukemia. He was treated at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center and is currently in remission. The Doughton family decided to start the family foundation and have raised more than $100,000 for leukemia research and patient assistance.Y
Johnny Graham, Ph.D. ’75, ’83
Graham is part of the lore of the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department
at UNC Charlotte. He arrived at the University after serving in the Vietnam War and was among the first students in what was then a new civil engineering program.
After completing his degree in 1975, Graham worked for several years as an engineer before returning to the University to work on his Master of Science in Engineering. He went on to study at N.C. State, graduating with a Ph.D. in 1990.
Graham served as a visiting assistant professor at UNC Charlotte, beginning in 1982; he was promoted to associate professor in 1992. With his arrival on campus as a faculty member, he brought with him a culture in which motivating and encouraging students was as fundamental as the content of the lesson plan.
This culture still exists today, and it is what makes the department unique. During his tenure, Graham taught 146 different sections and more than 5,500 students. Many of those students have gone on to have distinguished careers of their own, often attributing their success to his mentorship and inspiration.
Kyle White ’13
UNC Charlotte’s founder, Bonnie Cone, would have proudly call Kyle White one of her
“Bonnie’s Boys” for choosing to attend UNC Charlotte after his service in the military. He completed a degree in finance and began his career in Charlotte with the Royal Bank of Canada.
In 2014, White received a distinction that stands out from nearly all other men and women who have served in the U.S. Armed Forces: he was awarded the Medal of Honor by President
Obama for heroic actions in Afghanistan in 2007.
He administered life-saving medical aid to comrades and radioed situational reports after his team of 14 soldiers was ambushed. At the time, he became just the seventh living recipient of the
nation’s highest military honor from the war in Afghanistan.
In the future, White’s goal is to help men and women in uniform who return to the United States recognize the opportunities the current GI Bill provides them in hopes they too will pursue a degree in higher education.
The Office of Alumni Affairs contributed content for this article.
Photo: Chancellor Dubois and Gene Johnson, chair of the Board of Trustees, (left and second left) and Deborah Pittman, Alumni Association president (fourth left) congratulate 2015 Alumni Association Award recipients Johnny Graham, Bobby Brame, Lynn Dobson, Howard Godfrey, Mark Doughton and Fabian Elliott