Alumna Tanya Y. Mitchell ’79 Honored Dean Quiester Craig’s Legacy With a Story Rooted in Gratitude and Purpose

When Tanya Y. Mitchell introduced More Than a Dean to the Aggie community, she did more than release a book. She honored a man who helped shape her future and generations of North Carolina A&T students; Dean Quiester Craig.

She arrived at North Carolina A&T in 1975 from Roper, North Carolina, with a clear goal and a strong work ethic. Once she reached A&T, upperclassmen warned her that accounting under Dean Craig would be tough. She stayed committed, embraced the challenge, and graduated magna cum laude in accounting during an important period of the business school’s growth.

Mitchell said her connection to North Carolina A&T reinforced the values she had already learned at home: hard work, discipline, and the importance of education. But the university, and particularly the School of Business and Economics (now the Willie A. Deese College of Business and Economics), sharpened those lessons into a larger sense of purpose. Under Craig’s leadership, she developed professionalism and a clear sense of purpose.

Dean Craig stood at the center of that experience.

In describing how the university influenced her personal, professional, and creative journey, Mitchell emphasized that Craig was more than just a dean. He mentored students to succeed. He expected high academic achievement and professional preparedness, and for students who met his standards, he invested in their futures in tangible ways. Mitchell said he introduced her to the CPA profession and inspired her to pursue the field’s highest credentials. She also recalled that he helped ease the financial burden on her family by placing her on scholarship and later facilitated an internship in New York City with Arthur Andersen, then one of the nation’s most prestigious Big Eight accounting firms. There was such a shortage of African American CPAs at the time that opportunity helped launch the kind of career she did not know existed.

That career spanned 42 years in audit, accounting, and financial management, including leadership roles with Arthur Andersen & Co., Citibank, Manufacturers Hanover Bank, American Express, and Prudential Financial before she later transitioned to the nonprofit sector. Yet even after retiring as a CPA and CFO, Mitchell remained clear about the source of much of her foundation. She saw Dean Craig as one of the people who helped move her from promise to preparation, from ambition to achievement.

That was one of the reasons she felt compelled to write More Than a Dean.

But the path to authorship did not begin in celebration. It began in loss.

Mitchell said she had been listening for news of Craig’s retirement for years because she wanted to attend when that moment came. His retirement celebration dinner was scheduled for April 2013, and she planned to attend with her sisters, both A&T business school alumni. Just days before the event, however, her son, also a graduate of the business school, called her from the hospital. What followed was one of the most painful chapters of her life. He received a serious diagnosis, and Mitchell never made it to the retirement celebration. After fifteen months, the illness ultimately took his life.

Still, in the middle of that painful chapter, something meaningful took root.

Mitchell said that as she realized she would not be able to attend Craig’s retirement, she felt moved to write him a letter of gratitude to thank him for everything he had done for her.

At first, that thought remained dormant as she focused on her son and endured the heartbreak that followed. Then, during homecoming in October 2015, a conversation with fellow Aggie Kevin Baucom brought the idea rushing back. When he asked why she had not attended Craig’s retirement celebration, Mitchell shared what had happened with emotion, and in that exchange, the idea of writing Craig a letter returned with new force. Baucom urged her to write it. Mitchell said that when she returned home to New Jersey, the idea expanded even further. She no longer felt called to write only her letter. She felt called to gather letters from other students as well.

That became the beginning of the Letters of Gratitude project, one of the most meaningful parts of the book’s creation.

By October 2016, Mitchell had collected 113 letters from students, faculty, colleagues, and others whose lives Craig had touched. They confirmed something she had long known from experience: Craig’s legacy lives most powerfully in people.

That project eventually grew into something larger than a collection of tributes.

Mitchell said that after presenting the letters to Craig, she found herself wondering what should happen next. By then, she had learned much more about the full scope of his life’s work and achievements, much of which she had not fully understood as a student. Just like he had done while she was a student, he empowered her by granting her permission to document his story, and over time, that work became More Than a Dean. In her interview, she explained that preserving his legacy in book form was important, as it allowed her to connect the history and tell a fuller, more in-depth story with context.

Her own ties to the Aggie community influenced that work at every stage.

Mitchell said she had lived through part of the history she was writing about. She experienced the business school during Craig’s early years when he was shaping its future. But writing the book helped her understand the larger historical forces that shaped him as well. She traced his life back through segregated schools, his education at Morehouse College and Atlanta University, and the barriers he faced when corporate America remained closed to Black professionals. She understood that to tell his story well, it was important to include the history to clarify the significance of his life’s work and achievements, as well as those of his students, for readers.

That broader historical lens deepened the emotional force of the book.

One of the things that stood out to Mitchell most during the writing process was Craig’s humility. She said he valued teamwork, often shared his accomplishments, and did not naturally center himself, even though his impact was undeniable. That modesty made him admirable and strengthened her conviction that someone needed to preserve his history and explain why it mattered.

She also never lost sight of the personal lessons he had given her, remembering them even to this day.

Mitchell recalled that Craig taught her practical habits that reflected a larger philosophy of success. He told her to wear a watch and always be on time. He coached her not to be intimidated by people because we were all made in the same likeness. Those details may have seemed small on the surface, but together they revealed the kind of mentor he was someone who observed his students, expected discipline, and believed that students should be prepared not only academically, but professionally and personally.

Mitchell’s book also showed that Craig’s influence reached well beyond business students.

In the interview, she explained that some of the people most moved by Craig’s mentorship had not even majored in business. She pointed to others who shared how he had encouraged and guided them, including alumni outside the business school. That, too, helped explain the title. To Mitchell and many others, Craig was truly more than a dean. He was a mentor, a role model, and a source of steady investment in people’s lives.

The book’s emotional depth was further shaped by the letters Mitchell gathered.

The letters did not simply praise Craig. They demonstrated, in vivid and personal ways, how he changed lives.

For Mitchell, that was part of what made the book so important for Aggies and future readers.

 She hopes it leaves readers with a deeper understanding of the role HBCUs play in educating, uplifting, and preparing students to lead.

She describes A&T as a special place shaped by people who inspire students to take on the world particularly in business and other professional spaces where access has not always come easily. Preserving this history, she believes, is essential, as the university’s story and the stories of those who built it deserve to be documented and carried forward.

Ultimately, the book is intended to inspire future students and stand as a testament to the greatness of A&T.

That sense of responsibility gave More Than a Dean its emotional center.

It is about what one mentor could set in motion across generations. It was about how a first-generation college student from Roper could become an accomplished executive and first-time author, then turn around and use her own voice to preserve the legacy of the man who put her on her career path.

In the end, Mitchell’s book is both a tribute and a testimony.

It honored Dean Quiester Craig’s life and leadership, but it also honored the students he believed in, the doors he helped open, and the institution that made those stories possible.

For Mitchell, writing More Than a Dean was an act of gratitude. It was also an act of historical preservation, shaped by heartbreak, sharpened by reflection, and carried forward by a profound sense of calling.

Through her words, she ensured that Dean Craig’s legacy will not only be remembered but also understood.

By: Deja Huggins, Advancement Communications Coordinator

Media Contact: dhuggins2@ncat.edu