ECSU holds 147th Commencement on December 13
Kesha Williams
December 10, 2008
Elizabeth City State University held its 147th Commencement Convocation on December 13 in the Robert L. Vaughan Center. Mr. Anthony E. Foriest was our commencement speaker. His biography appears below: Mr. Foriest worked 22 years with Xerox Corporation in numerous capacities, including Internal Control Manager as a supervisor of all office support personnel and management of security and facilities for five North Carolina locations Senior Account Manager, where he was responsible for selling low and high volume copier and duplicators sales to major accounts in the Piedmont Triad area Supply Business Specialist, where he was responsible for the Carolina Business Unit meeting a $13 million supply revenue budget. Mr. Foriest officially retired from Xerox in 1999 and has continued working extensively in the community and his home church, First Baptist Church in Graham, where he presently serves on the Board of Deacons, in the Sunday school and in the male chorus. He is also active as a board member of the MidCarolina Bank in Graham, a board member of the Alamance County Friendship Center, a board member of the Alamance County Arts Council, a board member of the Alamance County Friends of the Library and co-chairman of the Closing the Achievement Gap Committee appointed by the Alamance County Board of Education. Mr. Foriest has served extensively within the Democratic Party in the past, including two terms as chairman of the Alamance County Democratic Party, a member of the NC Democratic Party Executive Committee and, chairman of the NC Senior Democrats. Mr. Foriest is also a 2004 recipient of the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation’s "Nancy Susan Reynolds Award" for his service to Alamance County in race relations. In November, 2006 Mr. Foriest was elected to represent Alamance and Caswell Counties in the North Carolina General Assembly. He serves on eight committees in the N.C. Senate including the following: Appropriations on Education/Higher Education Commerce Small Business and Entrepreneurship and the Joint Select Committee on Economic Development Incentives. Mr. Foriest grew up in Alamance County and was educated in the Burlington-Alamance School System. He has been married to his wife, Clara, for 37 years and they have an adult daughter, Pamela F. Alsbrooks, and an adult son, Bryant C. Foriest. He graduated from the former Central High School in Graham in 1966. He served in the US Army for three years before finishing his undergraduate education at UNC Chapel Hill, majoring in economics. In 1994 he completed graduate requirements for his MBA from Elon University.