On June 1, 1995, Dr. Covington assumed the presidency of Radford University, becoming the first African-American to head a predominantly white university in the Commonwealth of Virginia.  Dr. Covington has previously served as Chancellor of Winston-Salem State University in North Carolina; as President of Alabama A&M University in Huntsville, Alabama; and as President of Cheyney University of Pennsylvania, the nation's first Historically Black educational institution.

Dr. Covington has held leadership roles on governing boards of numerous civic and professional organizations at the state and national levels.  Some of these include: the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (Executive Committee of the Association and State Representative from North Carolina); the National Association for Equal Opportunity; the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (Executive Committee); the Governor's Task Force on the Reorganization of Higher Education in Alabama; the National Joint Committee on Economic Education; the North Carolina Medical Care Commission (Executive Committee); the North Carolina Board of Theater Arts; the North Carolina Art Museum, and the Art Museum of Western Virginia.  Dr. Covington has also served on the Indiana State Board of Education, the Faulkner University Board of Trustees, Virginia's A. L. Philpott Manufacturing Extension Partnership's Board of Trustees, the Board of Directors for the Holding Company of the First National Bank Corporation, and as Chairman of the Steering Committee on Historically Black Colleges and Universities   for the U.S. Department of the Interior.  In addition, he has served as a consultant to the Kellogg Foundation, the Hanes Corporation, the National Council for Higher Education Management Systems, and the U.S. Agency for International Development.

Dr. Covington's professional leadership activities have allowed him to travel extensively throughout the United States and abroad.  He represented professional organizations and governmental agencies through visits to Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Venezuela, England, France, Switzerland, and Israel, as well as the African republics of Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Senegal.

Dr. Covington keeps an active schedule as a keynote speaker at university convocations, community-sponsored programs, and national conferences for professional and civic organizations.  His achievements have been recognized through meritorious awards and citations from numerous professional and civic organizations at the local, state, national and international levels.  Among these was his recent induction into the Hall of Fame of The Ohio State University's College of Education.

Having pursued athletic and artistic interests as a student at the secondary and collegiate levels, Dr. Covington remains an avid sports enthusiast and a patron of the arts.  He is married to the former Beatrice Mitchell of Dayton, Ohio.  The Covingtons are the parents of two adult sons, Anthony Douglas and Jeffrey Steven.  Dr. Covington retired as universtiy president in June of 2005.

John Preston
McConnell

David Wilbur
Peters

Charles Knox
Martin

Donald Newton Dedmon

Douglas Covington

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