Dr. Larry E. Warren ('66)

If you ask Dr. Larry E. Warren (‘66) of Clinton, NC, to tell you his life story, he’ll say that he might do it all differently if he could go back, but one thing he’d never change-attending NC State. Dr. Warren had his first experience at NC State as a Clinton High School student when he attended an advanced chemistry program during the summer of his junior year. “This was my first experience away from home,” he said. An experience that he believes helped him prepare for his freshman year at NC State. Although excelling in high school, the transition to a university with an enrollment greater than the population of his home town was not easy.

Through his estate plans, Dr. Warren will fund an endowment that will support merit-based scholarships, with a preference for financial need, for students from Clinton High School who have shown strong character and an interest in social ethics and justice. In addition to Dr. Warren’s generous estate gift, he has also started funding an annual award to a Clinton High School Freshman to attract them to State. As he puts it, "going to college is so much more expensive now. I hope to give a student who came from a similar situation the opportunity to go to State.” Dr. Warren’s scholarship will support a student of any major.

Today, Dr. Warren is rehabilitating his mother’s childhood farm in Clinton and is part of a conservation program to grow long-leaf pines. But it’s his gift to NC State that he hopes will preserve his legacy in perpetuity. “After attending State, a person will be a contribution to society. I don’t think anybody could go wrong by going to State,” he says.