Carolina Holbrook is pictured with Dr. Jim Turcotte, vice president for enrollment services and dean of students at Mississippi College.
CLINTON, Miss. – Carolina Holbrook, of Cullman, has been selected to Who's Who at Mississippi College. Mississippi College leaders recently recognized 89 outstanding students at the initial meeting of the newly revised Who's Who chapter on the Clinton campus.
The February 16 event at Swor Auditorium included remarks from Jay Richardson, pastor of Highland Colony Parkway Baptist Church in Ridgeland. Richardson is an MC graduate. Parents, family members and friends were invited to salute the students that Friday.
Mississippi College officials acted to keep the campus organization alive in Clinton after the national Who's Who organization stopped accepting student nominations for 2017-18. Henry Pettus Randall, then a University of Alabama student, founded the national organization in 1934. Chapters grew over more than 80 years of existence to honor top-notch students at more than 1,000 colleges and universities across the USA. But financial problems mounted last year. And the Who's Who Among Students in American Colleges and Universities discontinued its honors program, said Jim Turcotte, vice president for enrollment services and dean of students at Mississippi College.
As a result, Turcotte consulted with student leaders and others on campus. They agreed to keep the recognition activities alive at Mississippi College in 2018 and future years. The new organization will be called "Who's Who at Mississippi College."
Over the years, speakers at "Who's Who" ceremonies at the Baptist-affiliated university have included Jerry Rankin, president emeritus of the International Mission Board, and Gayle Wicker, a University of Mississippi administrator and wife of U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker. Rankin and Wicker, the first woman to become student body president at Mississippi College, are both MC graduates.
The new inductees into "Who's Who" will be recognized by President Lee Royce and other university leaders during ceremonies each year. Students selected to the "Who's Who" organization are evaluated on the basis of their academic performance, community service and leadership skills.
Mississippi College, affiliated with the Mississippi Baptist Convention, is a private, co-educational, Christian university of liberal arts and sciences serving more than 5,100 students, from 40 states and more than three dozen countries. Founded in 1826, Mississippi College is the oldest institution of higher learning in Mississippi, the largest private university in the state and America's second oldest Baptist college. Mississippi College is home to 84 areas of undergraduate study, 16 graduate programs, a doctor of jurisprudence, a doctor of education leadership degree and a doctor of professional counseling degree. Mississippi College seeks to be a university recognized for academic excellence and commitment to the cause of Christ.
