A new Libraries scholarship gives students the help they need—and deserve

When Mark Bailey and Stephen Edgerton came to the Libraries’ “Donors and Scholars” event in February, they were expecting a pleasant evening of storytelling and information. They left inspired to create a legacy helping NC State students succeed.

The couple sat at a table next to Carmella Hawkins, a Computer Engineering major and Libraries student worker in the Access Services department. And though the presentations from the podium that evening were interesting, it was their instant connection with Hawkins—a Libraries Student Scholarship recipient—that lit the light bulbs over their heads.

Now they have created the Mark Bailey and Stephen Edgerton Libraries Scholarship Endowment—a fund that will be used to provide need-based scholarships for student employees at the Libraries with preference to students who have worked in the LGBTQ+ community or have an interest in LGBTQ+ issues. The gift honors their partnership as well as their professional successes and family backgrounds. And it might not have happened if they’d sat at a different table.

“Our neighbors bought us a membership to the Friends of the Libraries,” Bailey recalls. “They thought it was something we might want to get involved with now that I had just retired. We went to that event not knowing what to expect, and we were seated at a table with a wonderful group.”

“Steve got to know Carmella really well. She sat with us and that was a catalyst for us to be interested in what the Libraries is doing and the extent to which we are getting involved. Everybody treated us like we'd been there all our lives. It was a very encouraging and positive experience.”

“I sat next to Carmella and we immediately hit it off and we just began yammering,” Edgerton says. “She was very interesting—more interested in what I had to say than the other way around. I think I talked more than she did but we talked about movies and all kinds of things. And Carmella and I texted for a while after that about movies that we had discovered. She turned me on to some movies and I turned her on to some too.”

Bailey and Edgerton learned more about Hawkins’ journey to NC State and her need to both work and piece together financial aid in order to afford it. In Hawkins, they saw flashes of so many important people in their own pasts who had struggled to achieve and to help them achieve.

Bailey thought of his mother, who had recently passed away, and who had founded the NC State chapter of the National Organization for Chi Omega. He also thought of a former co-worker—a young Black woman he had hired while she was still a student who had patiently and tenaciously fought her way up the corporate ladder despite constantly encountering prejudice. Steve, who grew up on a farm in rural Robeson County, thought of his grandmother and great aunt who raised him while his parents were working—and especially of the work ethic and determination in the old stories they told about their lives.

The common thread through all of these connections is giving to help others, whether it’s through philanthropy, mentorship, or both. Bailey and Edgerton saw that they could offer both in order to help NC State students like Hawkins.

“The whole thing for us is that there are so many people who need an education or want an education and can't afford it,” Bailey says. “Back when we were in school, the state paid for most of our education just because it was so cheap. A year at UNC-Chapel Hill cost my parents $1,000 fifty years ago. Now when you send your kids to college it's just like—oh my God, I don't know how parents do it.”

“Loans and debt,” answers Edgerton. “This is how Americans do it. We go into debt.”

In addition to a financial award, Bailey and Edgerton also wanted to offer a kind of mentorship as part of the scholarships from their fund. Having both benefited from the guidance of elders in their families, in school, and in workplaces, they wanted to pass their experience and wisdom on—or help connect students to other mentorship opportunities.

Bailey, who grew up in the Raleigh area, got an Education degree from UNC-Chapel Hill in 1978. While working for Wake County Public Schools, he studied at NC State, attaining a Master’s in Education specializing in Learning Disabilities in 1982 and a certificate in Education Supervision in 1984. After nine years of teaching, he switched careers to work for a medical device company, eventually finding his way into management. Over a career in which he managed international teams, he realized that his lifelong interest in education formed his philosophy of management.

After growing up in a rural setting, Edgerton worked as a graphic artist for the NC State College of Veterinary Medicine. A passion for genealogy led him to volunteer at the State Archives of North Carolina where he worked on a project to identify as many slaves in the state’s history as possible by name and location so that families can search for their often-lost documentation.

The couple’s connections to archives and education perfectly match the mission of the Libraries which enables them to fund a legacy to help young people as they were helped along their own paths.

“We're not in any position really to be mentors, but we do know many pretty successful professionals that could possibly steer a student forward,” Bailey says. “We like the idea of some type of involvement—although we don't want to interject ourselves in a student’s life—but if there's any way that we can be of assistance. I felt that, having managed international work teams at sites around the world, I was most interested in the people that worked for me and what I looked for in a candidate working for me. I wanted to offer that knowledge to students like Carmella.”

Coincidentally, Hawkins was selected to receive the first scholarship from their fund this year. She plans to graduate in the spring and hopes to pursue work in software engineering as well as to become an author.