2 0 0 8 V o l l e y b a l lA d m i n i s t r a t i o nDr. Mitchell (Mick) M. Zais has been president of NewberryCollege since August of 2000. He earned an engineering degreefrom the U.S. Military Academy at West Point; a Master of Artsdegree in military history from the School for Advanced MilitaryStudies at Leavenworth, Kansas; and Master of Science and Ph.D.degrees in social psychology and organizational behavior from theUniversity of Washington. He is also a graduate of the NationalDefense University where he was a post-doctoral research fellowin national security affairs.Dr. Zais has been appointed by Governor Mark Sanford torepresent the state’s 20 private colleges and universities on theSouth Carolina Commission on Higher Education. He also servesas a member of the Governor’s Council for Educational Reformof secondary education in South Carolina. He is a member ofthe Newberry Opera House Foundation, the Greater Columbia Chamber of Commerce, theLutheran Education Conference of North America, and the Southeastern Region of ThriventFinancial for Lutherans. In the South Atlantic (athletic) Conference, he serves as Chairmanof the Presidents’ Council. He also represents the private college and university presidentsof the southeastern United States on the Board of Directors of the national Foundation forIndependent Higher Education. Dr. Zais also serves as Chairman of the Lieutenant Governor’sadvisory council on aging.Dr. Zais has written and published extensively in the fields of organizational behavior,curriculum design, stress, military history and doctrine, and leadership and management, in suchprofessional journals as the Journal of Applied Psychology, Armed Forces Journal International,Military Review, Parameters, etc. His opinion-editorial pieces, written while President of NewberryCollege, have appeared in newspapers across the state.Before becoming Newberry College’s 20th president, Dr. Zais served his country for over30 years as an officer in the United States Army, attaining the rank of brigadier general. As anassistant professor at West Point, he taught management consulting, organizational behavior,and leadership.A paratrooper and Ranger, Dr. Zais served in a wide variety of infantry units, in Vietnam,the United States, and Korea. He commanded two rifle companies, an infantry battalion, alight infantry brigade, and served as deputy commanding general at Fort Riley, Kansas. Hisexperience is in military plans and operations, having worked as chief of operations, plans, andtraining for an infantry battalion; war plans officer for a corps; and Chief of War Plans for theChairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff.Dr. Zais was a White House aide and served in Panama as executive assistant to thefour-star commander of all U.S. forces in Central and South America. In Kuwait, he was commandinggeneral of U.S. and Allied forces. He also served as commanding general of OperationProvide Refuge, the task force that cared for the 4,000 Kosovo refugees who entered theUnited States. Prior to coming to Newberry College, Zais was the Chief of Staff of the U.S. ArmyReserve Command, the headquarters that administers more than 200,000 military membersof the Army Reserve.Dr. Zais’s military awards and decorations include the Distinguished Service Medal, theDefense Superior Service Medal, the Legion of Merit, the Bronze Star, the Meritorious ServiceMedal, the Air Medal, the Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal, the Humanitarian ServiceMedal, the Ranger, Airborne, and Combat Infantryman’s Badges, and the South CarolinaMeritorious Service Medal.His wife, the former Susan Fincher, is from Columbia and a graduate of the University of SouthCarolina. Susan’s great-great-great-grandfather was a founding member of the Newberry CollegeBoard of Trustees. They have two children: Bradley is an infantry soldier in Iraq; Ashley,is an intern coordinator for presidential hopeful John McCain.Andy Carter is entering his seventh year as the NewberryCollege Director of Athletics, having joined the Newberry family inSeptember of 2002.Since taking the helm, Carter has spearheadedseveral projects in order to turn Newberry Athletics into one of thepremier programs in Division II.Carter came to Newberry after 17-year tenure at MissouriBaptist University. Upon receiving his undergraduate degree fromthe NAIA institution, he began his career as an admissions recruiterand assistant baseball coach while working on his master’s ofbusiness administration at Lindenwood University. His degreecompletion led him to a faculty position as an Instructor of BusinessAdministration and Economics at Missouri Baptist, while at the sametime serving the school as head baseball coach.Carter took over as baseball coach in 1991 and during hisnine seasons at the helm won seven consecutive conference championships. Seven yearsinto a successful coaching career, he also took over as Missouri Baptist’s athletic director. Heserved in both roles for two years before leaving coaching in order to devote all his attentionto administrative duties.Almost immediately upon his arrival at Newberry, Carter presented the Board of Trusteeswith the “Newberry College Athletic Initiative”, a long-term plan to secure future athletic success,while maintaining Newberry’s excellent academic record for its athletics teams. Newberry hasundergone an overhaul of its athletic program, instituting a stringent evaluation process for allvarsity sports.The results were almost immediate, as the athletic program nearly doubled SouthAtlantic Conference victories in consecutive years under Carter’s reign. Also, for the first timesince 1999, Newberry enhanced its offering of varsity sports, adding wrestling and competitivecheerleading.Academic achievement and student development are the cornerstones of the department.A growing student-athlete population (222 in 2002-03 up to 500 in 2007-08) have set thestandard in the South Atlantic Conference (SAC) by winning four of the past five GPA titles andhave achieved a cumulative GPA as high as 3.01 (2007-2008). The College’s commitment, asevidenced by the implementation of our Mentoring Skills program, is to maintain this successfor the future.The student-athlete experience directly correlates to the relationship they have with theirhead coach. Annual evaluations and emphasis on desired results produced by the head coachesin the department aided in staff hiring and the development process. The success in hiring anddeveloping all departmental staff (Coaches, administration, and staff) is directly correlated tothe commitment shown by the College.The tenure of our head coaches, each program’s win-loss records, and the quality of eachincoming recruiting class provide a window of the varied levels of success that will continueblessing the College for years to come.Facility enhancement has also been a major focal point for this administration. In thesummer of 2006 a new Astro Turf football field was installed. This provided a state of the art fieldfor practice and competition. The team responded by winning all 9 games played at Setzler Field,including our first ever NCAA DII post-season victory. Through the fall 2007 season, Newberryfootball has produced a 15-0 home record on the new turf.The 2007-2008 academic year brought the Phase I completion of the first of three newfacilities at the Smith Road Athletic Complex with the completion of the Baseball facility. Thisfacility will be the proud home for Newberry baseball for years to come and will provide a greatopportunity to engage our community. The other facilities slated for the Smith Road Complexare new Softball and Soccer facilities. Also, the Newberry basketball and volleyball teamsbegan playing last season on a new finished gym floor, powered by a brand new, state-of-theart lighting system.Future plans include new facilities for the men’s and women’s tennis teams, a practicefacility for the Wrestling program, and determining the best course of action to give the footballfacilities at Setzler Field its first facelift in almost 20 years.Success on the fields, courts, and fairways has come as the result of great processes.Our coaches have taught their student-athletes that we must win every day; in the classroom andon the fields, courts, and fairways. During the 2002-03 year we won 19% of SAC competitions.The progress has been steady and reached 53% in 2006-2007. This marked the first time thedepartment ever eclipsed the 50% winning percentage since becoming a DII SAC member.Other competitive successes have come in the All-Sports competition. In 2002-03, we scored21 points across the 14 representative sport programs. This placed Newbery last in the SACstandings, a place they have finished each year. Once again, the rise has been steady as wescored successively more points each year leading up to the 2006-07 year when we scored 76points and finished third in the standings, only 6 points out of first place.As the Vice President for Intercollegiate Athletics, he serves on the Newberry President’sCabinet, under Dr. Mitchell Zais. He also is member of the National Association of Collegiate Directorsof Athletics and serves as a Board Member for the D2 Athletics Director’s Association.Carter is married to his wife of 23 years, Rena. They have seven children: Aaron (20), asenior cadet at USMA-West Point, Becca (19), Beth (16), Jake (14), Rachel (12), Caleb (10),and Micah (8).2 0 0 8 V o l l e y b a l l M e d i a G u i d e
2 0 0 8 V o l l e y b a l lC o a c h D a v i d N i c h o l s o nDavid Nicholson enters his first season as the head women’s volleyball coach at Newberry College.“I am looking forward to joining the coaching staff at Newberry,” Nicholson said. “It will be my job to build onthe success of last season and I will work hard to do that. My wife and I are excited about relocating to theNewberry area.”“David Nicholson is a great fit for Newberry College and our volleyball program,” Carter said. “He has a quietconfidence about him that fits our team well. He is an outstanding choice to lead our program to the nextlevel.”Nicholson comes to the Palmetto State after a brief stint in the spring of 2008 as the head coach at the Universityof Texas at Brownsville and Texas Southmost College.Prior to his time at UTB/TSC, Nicholson spent three seasons as the head coach at Union College in Barbourville,Ky. Under Nicholson’s tutelage, the Lady Bulldogs earned their highest win total in school history in the2007 season with a 34-15 mark and an Appalachian Athletic Conference (AAC) regular season championship.H e a d C o a c h1 s t S e a s o nNicholson was named the 2007 Coach of the Year in both the AAC and NAIA Region XII. The 2007 squadboasted the AAC Player of the Year, Setter of the Year, Freshman of the Year and Region XII Player of the Year.The Bulldogs also had three first team and one second team all-AAC selections, with the three all-conferenceplayers also earning all-region accolades.In 2006, the Lady Bulldogs recorded their sixth 20-win season in going 21-17 overall and 12-6 in AppalachianAthletic Conference play. Nicholson has had one player earn NAIA All-American Honorable Mention honors,two NAIA Setters of the Week nods, three All-Conference First Team selections, three All-Region First Teamselections and two conference All-Freshman Team selections.Nicholson’s ProfilePersonalDate of Birth April 19, 1970Place of Birth Olympia, Wash.EducationHigh School Port Angeles HS ‘88College Western Carolina ‘05Coaching Record2005 Union (Ky.) 11-192006 Union (Ky.) 21-172007 Union (Ky.) 34-15Total: Three Seasons 66-51Nicholson came to Union after spending the previous two seasons as an assistant at Western Carolina (N.C.)University, a NCAA Division I program. During that time, the Catamounts went 28-33 overall.Prior to his tenure at Western Carolina, Nicholson compiled an extensive high school coaching career. Hefirst served as the head coach at Crescent High School, in Port Angeles, Wash., from 1992-95, taking over aprogram which had not seen a victory in over five years. In his third season as the coach there, the team wasat the top of its conference.From 1995-97, Nicholson served as the freshman volleyball coach at Rainier High School, in Rainier, Ore.,and then was hired as the head coach at Clatskanie High School, in Clatskanie, Ore., in 1997. While there,he guided his team to a league championship and a sixth place finish in the state. He followed that up with aseventh place finish at the state level the following year. During this time, Nicholson additionally coached theTiger Club Team in Clatskanie.In July of 2000, Nicholson made the move across the country to Hayesville, N.C., and served as the assistantvolleyball coach at Murphy High School. After his stint with Murphy, Nicholson was appointed the athletic directorand head volleyball coach of Hiwassee Dam High School, in 2001. He was involved with all aspects of theprogram in this new position from scheduling to transportation of the teams.Nicholson has also spent his spare time officiating high school volleyball and basketball games in the westernNorth Carolina area and was selected to officiate the 2002 3A State Championship volleyball match.A 2005 graduate of Western Carolina, Nicholson received his Master’s in Education from Union in December2006.N e w b e r r y A t h l e t i c S i t e . c o mNicholson is married to the former Jennifer Rogers of Murphy, N.C.
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