Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, October 15, 1994                   TAG: 9410170054
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

ROANOKE NATIVE LEADS N.C. SYSTEM

``If I had gotten a signal that this choice was being made because of the people I selected to be my parents, you'd be talking to somebody else,'' Hackley said Thursday after the state community colleges board selected him as the first black to head the system.

``When it comes to being a first, I think I'm the first person from Roanoke, Virginia, to head up a community college system,'' he said.

Hackley, 54, has been chancellor of Fayetteville, N.C., State University since 1988. He formerly taught at the Government Executives Institute at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and at the University of Arkansas, and was an administrator for UNC.

``I guarantee you I will give it my all,'' Hackley told the board minutes after its unanimous vote to name him president. ``You won't ever have to worry about where my priorities are.''

``When you look at all of what he [Hackley] had, all of his strengths, when you put those together, he stood above the rest'' of the applicants, said Lt. Gov. Dennis Wicker, who is chairman of the community college board.

Hackley said he and the board will work on plans to take the community college system ``to the next level.''

``All elements of education need to be better,'' said Hackley, who started his career at a community college in Traverse City, Mich. ``It's not that they're doing a bad job now, but the demands are constantly changing.

``We have to take a look at what the marketplace wants us to produce.''

Community colleges ``are going to change the education landscape in North Carolina more than any other element,'' he said.