Judge William Webb, chairman of the UNC Board of Governors Committee on Military and Veterans Affairs, came to UNC Charlotte Nov. 12 to learn more about the University’s programs to help its veteran students, groundbreaking research and efforts to hire more veterans.
UNC Charlotte Board of Trustees member Brett Keeter ’99 welcomed Webb to campus and credited him as the force behind creating the Committee on Military and Veterans Affairs.
Webb, a U.S. Air Force and Vietnam veteran, was eager to learn how the University is making the campus more welcoming to veterans. The discussion was held in the University’s recently renovated Cpl. Robert Qutub USMC Veterans Lounge in Barnard Hall.
“The intent of the lounge is that it is a re-entry point for our students who are veterans,” said Bill Wilson, director of Veterans Services at UNC Charlotte. “It is not a place to behave a 100 percent like when they were in the military, but it’s a place to be around peers that understand the experience that they had.”
Zachary Burdick, an undergraduate student and member of the Air Force, said the Veterans Services Office was the first place he called when he considered enrolling in UNC Charlotte. And he said he visits the veterans lounge on a near daily basis.
“A lot of times when veterans transition off of active duty, they lose a sense of community,” Burdick told Webb. “They lose a sense of connection with their brothers and sisters and their coworkers and everything that they used to have. And this lounge and the Veterans Services Office I feel, especially for me, really provided that connection.”
UNC Charlotte enrolls more than 900 veteran and military-affiliated students. Webb said universities should aim to enroll, educate and graduate veterans.
“We need to enroll more veterans,” he said. ‘When we get them here, we need to have the ability to be sensitive enough to make the experience worthwhile for them. And we need to graduate them.”
Webb said veterans are sometimes stigmatized for mental health issues they suffer as a result of military trauma, and that the university environment should be one where they are comfortable asking for help.
UNC Charlotte is working to create such an environment with its Veterans Lounge, considered a safe space for veteran students. In it, Libby Malone, a clinical psychologist at the Christine F. Price Center for Counseling and Psychological Services, holds weekly discussion groups with veterans. Malone said the talks are a way of helping students transition from military to civilian life and manage life on campus. She covers topics with them that include suicide and substance use. Malone’s program is funded using student health fees.
The University is addressing the needs of veteran students in many unique ways.
Tabatha Maddox, a U.S. Army veteran and graduate student in social work, conducts programming specifically targeting female veterans. Diana Rowan, associate professor of social work who also is a U.S. Army veteran, is director of the Academy for Military and Veterans She is leading research on veterans’ issues, such as traumatic brain injury on the battlefield, the veteran experiences of minorities and the evaluation of sexual assault prevention programs in the military.
U.S. Army veteran Jerry Dahlberg is an associate professor of practice in the William States Lee College of Engineering who has helped to secure grants to recruit veterans to UNC Charlotte, retain them by providing peer assistance and get them employed in defense and naval jobs upon graduation.
Alan Freitag, professor of communication studies and an Air Force veteran, has led successful efforts to recruit veterans to graduate programs and provide scholarship support.
In addition to hosting the discussion, Webb served as the narrator of UNC Charlotte’s Veterans Day concert held Nov. 11 at Ovens Auditorium. The concert, “For Heroes Proved,” featured the Wind Ensemble, University Chorale and the Pride of Niner Nation Marching Band. Webb called the program “outstanding.”
Webb has had a long and distinguished legal career. After being honorably discharged from the Air Force, he graduated summa cum laude from the University of New Haven and earned a law degree from the University of Connecticut School of Law. He is a senior advisor at Shanahan Law Group in Raleigh. A magistrate judge for 14 years in the Eastern District of North Carolina, Webb is certified as a federal mediator in all three federal districts in North Carolina and a certified North Carolina Superior Court mediator. He has taught as an adjunct professor at the Campbell University Norman Adrian Wiggins School of Law.
Photo: Judge William Webb, front row, third right, visited UNC Charlotte to discuss the University’s efforts to welcome greater numbers of veteran students.