New chief diversity officer Charles E. Gibson III embraces life behind the Red Brick Wall

Charles E. Gibson III

Charles E. Gibson, III centers his work on several guiding principles. One of them is educational equity. The other is grace.

“Grace is actually central to my professional practice,” said Gibson, who started as Randolph’s chief diversity officer in April. “We all come into this world with no say about the culture we’re born into. We grow and develop and navigate through it in the best way we know how. None of us has all the answers. So when you are in fellowship with someone or you’re communicating with them, you need to afford them the same grace they afford to you.

“That’s really how I like to begin difficult conversations,” he added. “That’s something else I’m going to emphasize here, interaction with difference. We want people to be culturally competent and able to interact with other cultures without fear. And we want them to know how to do it appropriately.”

A liberal arts environment—where “there is intentionality behind introducing students to a variety of academic disciplines”—is the ideal place to foster those skills, Gibson said.

“Students are able to have a wide range of perspectives from which to view things,” he added. “Those conditions really allow for the cultivation of critical thinking in a way that’s unique. That’s really important—allowing people to develop the ability to critically analyze, to not take things at face value. There’s a focus on dialogue.”

Since starting in April, Gibson has jumped right into life behind the Red Brick Wall, attending events and getting to know students.

His passion for the field began while he was a student at Wake Forest University, where he served as a student leader in the university’s judicial affairs office.

Gibson was planning to go to law school when a conversation with Barbee Oakes, Wake Forest’s first chief diversity officer, piqued his interest.

“She asked if I’d considered going into higher education,” said Gibson, who graduated from Wake Forest with a bachelors’ degree in music and a minor in English. “I hadn’t, but I took it under advisement. Then, my senior year, she advocated for me in a way that left an indelible impression. It was really powerful. I wanted to do that for other people.”

Twenty years later, Gibson still has a letter Oakes wrote on his behalf.

“Whenever I have high points or low points in the job, I pull that letter out, and it takes me back,” he said. “It reminds me, ‘This is why you’re doing this.’”

Gibson earned his Master of Arts and Education Specialist degrees in higher education from Appalachian State University. He also received a Master of Education degree in higher education from Penn State, where he worked in the Office of Graduate Educational Equity Programs for five years.

He went into consulting work after that, before returning to higher education as Lees-McRae College’s inaugural chief diversity officer in 2021.

“I wasn’t fulfilled in the corporate space,” Gibson said. “I was a contractor. It just felt like I was doing a disservice to myself by my purpose being for a corporation to meet its bottom line. It just didn’t feel right.”

The job at Lees-McRae also brought him home, in a sense. Located in Banner Elk, North Carolina, Lees-McRae sits in the Appalachian Mountains, not far from where his father grew up near Asheville.

Gibson credits his multicultural family for providing the foundation for the work he does every day.

“I feel like it was some sort of divine ordering because I come from a very diverse family,” said Gibson, whose father is African American and mother is Mexican-American. “A lot of the skills I have developed over the years, I’ve inadvertently done just to interact with my family and get to know them better. I had to get skilled navigating through different cultures, but I never imagined I would call on those skills professionally like I do now.”

Gibson was raised in Inman Park, a historic district in Atlanta, Georgia, where his family still operates a bed and breakfast.

Driving down Rivermont Avenue feels eerily similar to his old neighborhood, and the mountain views bring him a sense of peace.

“My family is Afrilachian. We are black people from the foot of the Appalachian Mountains,” he said. “To be able to look out to the west and see the range, again, just felt right. Then I met the people of Randolph. It’s clear they are all driven by the same thing, which is to help students realize their potential.”

The students are why he does what he does.

“A lot of people have preconceived notions about what my work entails and who I serve,” he said. “My goal is for everyone to see themselves in the work.”