Dianne Carver Lawing

Dianne Carver Lawing was born in 1949 to working-class parents in Durham, NC. After serving in the U.S. Navy in World War II, her father was an instrument maker in the Physics Department of Duke University for 42 years. Her mother was a church secretary for more than 30 years and Dianne was one of three children, with an older brother and younger sister.

Dianne graduated from Charles E. Jordan High School in 1967 and always loved mathematics. She did not play any high school sports because there were no teams for girls then but she was very good at golf, tennis and softball. As a freshman at NC State, Dianne pledged Sigma Kappa, the only sorority on campus at the time, and later served as both Pledge Trainer and President. In her freshman year, there were less than 300 female students living on campus and it was not uncommon for Dianne to be the only female in classes, especially in the sciences and phys ed.

Dianne was the first member of her family to complete an undergraduate degree and graduated from N.C. State University in 1971 with a B.S. degree in Education.

She taught for five years in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Public School System and earned a Master’s of Education degree from Queen’s University in 1985. The same year, she accepted a position as a Middle School Mathematics Teacher at Charlotte Country Day School (CCDS) and, soon thereafter, became the Middle School Scheduler, a position she held until her retirement.

“After doing some research with a colleague about how girls and boys learn math differently, we convinced the head of middle school to allow us to divide an Algebra I class by gender,” she shared. “It was so successful that, the following year, all of the 7th and 8th grade math classes were gender- specific, a practice that continues at CCDS.”
Dianne received the Faculty Exceptional Performance Award twice and the Honorary Alumni Award in 2018. At the end of the 2017-18 school year, she retired from CCDS after 33 years of teaching there.

In 1971, Dianne married Thomas (Tommy) R. Lawing, Jr. who had graduated from NC State with a B.A. in Liberal Arts / Economics the same spring. In the spring of 1972, they welcomed their only child, Thomas R. (Tripp) Lawing, III, who also enjoyed mathematics and would graduate from the N.C. School of Science and Mathematics in 1991 before earning a B.A. degree in Mathematics and Computer Science from Cornell and a Master’s degree in Computer Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champagne. A few years later, Dianne introduced Tripp to a fellow middle school teacher at CCDS and, less than a year later, their son married Elizabeth (Beth) Grimes Cooper. You should always be nice to your mother; she may introduce you to your future wife.

“Education has always been important to our family. Tommy’s father was the first member of his family to earn an undergraduate degree (NC State ’48, B.S. in Agriculture). His sister, Cathy Lawing Rempson (NC State ’73, B.A. Liberal Arts/Economics) taught school in Cleveland County for several years and, his niece, Ashley Lawing Beam, has taught middle school in Charlotte-Mecklenburg and Cleveland County for many years.

Without college educations, neither of us would have been as successful in life as we have been and it is our hope that this scholarship will enable others to achieve a solid foundation from which they can share their love of teaching.”