William Carey University invites the public to attend a retirement reception for Dr. Tommy King, who has served the university as its president for more than 15 years.
The reception will be Thursday, July 28, from 4:30 p.m. until 6 p.m. at the King Student Center on WCU’s Hattiesburg campus.
Dr. King became president of William Carey University in 2007 – but his service to WCU goes back six decades. He is a WCU alumnus, a campus leader during his student days and the first Carey graduate to become president of the university. Before ascending to the presidency, he served as a WCU trustee, adjunct professor, department chair, and executive vice president.
King led WCU’s recovery in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, which destroyed the university’s first Gulf Coast campus. He chose the location, and directed the construction, of a new campus in Tradition. At the same time, WCU applied to open the WCU College of Osteopathic Medicine, which admitted its first class in 2010 at the Hattiesburg campus.
In January 2017, an EF3 tornado inflicted catastrophic damage to the Hattiesburg campus. Only one building was left unscathed. Six buildings were demolished, including the original Tatum Court. King led the rebuilding effort and cut the ribbon on the final tornado recovery project, new Tatum Court, in July 2019.
King was instrumental in establishing the WCU School of Pharmacy at the Tradition campus, a physical therapy doctoral program in Hattiesburg, and a new nursing school in Baton Rouge. He led the way to the construction of a new 67,000-square-foot facility for the College of Health Sciences. The most recent ribbon-cutting, in March 2021, was for the King Student Center, named in honor of Dr. King and his wife, Sandra.
Finally, during his tenure as president, King oversaw unprecedented growth in enrollment. The number of students has more than doubled, from 2,500 to more than 5,300. During the same period, the number of residential students in Hattiesburg has increased four-fold and six new dorms have opened.
Dr. King will be succeeded in the presidency by Dr. Ben Burnett. Currently executive vice president, Burnett will assume his new duties as the 10th president of William Carey University on Aug. 16.
For more information, call Charlotte Green at (601) 318-6495.
