Derick Close to Receive Watauga Medal

February 28, 2011

Derick Close of Charlotte is president and CEO of Springs Creative Products Group, a fabric and crafts business. A 1982 NC State textiles management graduate, he is a director and past president of the North Carolina Textile Foundation. Close helped initiate a scholarship program to attract talented students to the textiles program at NC State. He was honored as the outstanding alumnus of the College of Textiles in 2000.

Close served on the University of North Carolina system’s Board of Governors from 1994 to 1997 and the NC State Board of Trustees from 2001 to 2010. He currently serves as a board member for both corporations and community nonprofit agencies. In 2008 Close received Leadership Charlotte’s Schley Lyons Award for service to the community. He is also a partner in the Carolina Panthers NFL franchise and a former partner in Charlotte Knights AAA baseball. A longtime supporter of Wolfpack athletics, he has helped chair several fundraising efforts, including the Goal Line Drive committee to upgrade and renovate Carter-Finley Stadium.

Receiving the award with Close will be former state Extension Service director Dr. T. Carlton Blalock and Susan Ward, president of the state Veterinary Medical Foundation.

For more information about the Watauga Medal, previous winners and the program’s history, visit http://www.ncsu.edu/watauga.

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