N.C. A&T Alumni Times

North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University will establish a sports performance center to be named for 1975 alumni and longtime Aggie Athletic Foundation supporters Darnell S. Glover Sr. and Carolyn Harrison Glover.

The center will occupy the 12,430-square-foot Aggie Dome beside Moore Gymnasium and serve as an indoor training facility for the Aggies baseball, softball, golf and cheer teams. The space also will be used by the Air Force and Army ROTC programs for drills and the Department of Kinesiology for research.

“The center is another step toward addressing the needs of our students holistically,” intercollegiate athletics director Earl Hilton III said, noting the athletics department most recently added a nutritionist and mental health counselor to its resources.

While a completion date for the Aggie Dome transformation has not been announced, retrofitting the structure and adding training equipment is already under way, said Eric Hart, associate athletic director and executive director for major gifts.

“We will be the first university in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference to have something like this,” said Hart. “We deeply appreciate Darnell and Carolyn Glover for recognizing the need for this center and their commitment to making it reality, with an endowment to continue its funding.”

The Glovers each earned a B.S. in business administration from North Carolina A&T. Darnell Glover, who as an A&T student interned at Greensboro’s WFMY-TV from 1972 through 1976, serves as vice president of the Aggie Athletic Foundation and retired from Allstate Insurance Co. as a senior manager. Carolyn Glover earned her master’s degree from Hollins University and retired as the city of Roanoke, Virginia’s human resources director.

As four-year Aggie letterman in wrestling, Glover earned first place in the 1974 A&T Invitational and received the 1973-74 Hustle Award. The Snow Camp, North Carolina native was the first wrestler from Southern High School, where he also played football and ran track before graduating in 1971, to place in the North Carolina State High School Finals.

Glover, who joined Omega Psi Phi Fraternity Inc. after he began working for Allstate, said N.C. A&T offered “a very nurturing and family-oriented environment where there is always someone lifting you up.”

“One of the hurdles for historically black colleges and universities is to be counted in the top tier of all universities,” he said.

Establishing a state-of-the-art sports performance center at N.C. A&T is a step toward remedying that oversight.

“Our students deserve the same upscale amenities other elite universities have,” he said. “From an athletic standpoint, I want us to compete at a level where others don’t take us for granted. I want our programs to be at the top.”

From the time they became Aggies, the Glovers always believed N.C. A&T is an institution bound on achievement.

“This is another way for us to contribute to the university so other students will have the same opportunities to excel as we did,” said Carolyn Glover. “We are blessed to be in a position to do it.”

“We give back to North Carolina A&T because it has given back to us,” he said.