Tuesday, May 13, 2008 — Pfeiffer University’s sixth president Dr. Cameron P. West, died May 11 at age 87.
He was an education advocate and served a distinguished career in higher education, which began at Pfeiffer, where he served in several capacities, including professor of education from 1956-60 and as academic dean from 1960-66.
West’s leadership was central in founding the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities (NAICU) and he is also credited for his leadership in the creation of the North Carolina Legislative Tuition Grant, which has enabled hundreds of thousands of North Carolinians to afford access to baccalaureate higher education at the state’s independent colleges and universities.
West left and returned to Pfeiffer (then Pfeiffer College) to serve as the sixth president from 1978 until his retirement in 1988. He was named an honorary member of the Pfeiffer College Class of 1966, an honorary Pfeiffer alumnus and was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Pfeiffer. The Grace and Cameron West Art Gallery at Pfeiffer is named in honor of West and his late wife, Grace Creech West.
After retirement from Pfeiffer, West served as a consultant to Elon College and as interim president of Brevard College. He was a board member of the Foundation for International Education, and was involved in founding the Visiting International Faculty Pro-gram (VIF), the largest teacher exchange program in the United States.
He was appointed associate director of the North Carolina Board of Higher Education and served as a principal author of the 1968 Long Range Plan for Higher Education.
West was appointed director of higher education and led the effort in the General Assembly to create the current University of North Carolina system, which he served as its first vice president for planning.
After serving for one year as director of higher education in Illinois, West returned to North Carolina to serve as president of the North Carolina Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, which he led until assuming the Pfeiffer presidency in 1978.
His leadership was central in founding the NAICU, which since 1976 has served as the unified national voice of independent higher education on policy issues with the federal government. West received the annual Hugh McEniry Award from the N.C. Association of Colleges and Universities for a lifetime of leadership in North Carolina higher education.
Born in Walstonburg, N.C., Dr. West earned a bachelor’s degree from UNC Chapel Hill and served in the U.S. Army Air Corps during WWII. Following the war, he served as a public school administrator in Fairmont and Jacksonville, N.C. while earning his master’s and doctoral degrees from UNC Chapel Hill.
He was preceded in death by his wife of 50 years, Grace Creech West, and two brothers, Albert R. West and Ray West, Jr. Surviving family members include wife, Clara Coleman-West; three children, J. Cameron West, who is the president of Huntingdon College; Thomas R. West, a faithful member of the Pfeiffer Board of Trustees; and daughter Sarah West, a friend to Pfeiffer.
In lieu of flowers, the family requests memorial gifts are made to the Cameron P. and Grace West Scholarship Fund, Pfeiffer University, P.O. Box 960, Misenheimer, NC 28109.
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