A donation from Paul and Ann Batson allowed an extensive renovation of Greenville Technical College’s executive board room to be completed in fall 2024. Changes included new furniture and state-of-the-art conferencing and meeting technology.
Ribbon for the new space was cut on January 15 as Paul and Ann were recognized for their longstanding support of the college and higher education.
Paul earned an undergraduate degree at Clemson University and an MBA through the Clemson at Furman program in the early seventies. He was hired as a recruiter for Florence Darlington Technical College in 1971, his introduction to the state’s technical college system. In 1972, he was hired to teach part-time at Greenville Technical College, assigned to economics, cost accounting, and business machines classes.
“Very quickly, I absolutely fell in love with teaching,” Batson said. “It was the greatest and happiest of experiences in life for me to be in any class and share whatever it was that I had learned and to see people learn and ask questions, knowing it would help them in life, as it did me.”
In 1973, Batson was offered a full-time teaching position at Greenville Technical College with a salary of $10,300. The next year, Furman University hired him as an adjunct professor, where he taught night classes for the next 40 years.
In the mid-seventies, Batson moved into the role of dean of the business division at GTC, later becoming dean of research and evaluation, and then promoted to assistant VP for finance.
By 1980, Batson had moved into the private sector, building a successful career that led him to open an independent accounting and tax firm.
He returned to GTC as a member of the college’s governing board in 1998 and has served on the Area Commission ever since including two terms as chair from 2008 to 2012.
In 2005, he was appointed to the South Carolina Association of Technical College Commissioners (SCATCC), a group that promotes the education and training of South Carolinians and advocates for all South Carolina technical colleges. He was elected vice chair of the association’s executive committee in 2009 and chair in 2013, serving a four-year term in that role.
In 2015, Governor Nikki Haley appointed Batson to serve on the South Carolina Commission on Higher Education (CHE) to represent the entire technical college system. Currently he chairs CHE’s Finance Committee and is a member of the Student Affairs Committee.
“We are grateful to Paul and Ann for their commitment to the college over many, many years,” said Dr. Keith Miller, president of Greenville Technical College. “From his first teaching role to Paul’s longstanding board service as well as roles with SCATCC and CHE, Paul, with Ann’s steadfast support, has made education a priority. This college and higher education across the state are the clear beneficiaries.”