James_Nov-Dec_2025_web - Flipbook - Page 69
It is notable that Chattahoochee
Technical College President Heather
Pence comes from an accounting
background and has a pedigree of
experience often unseen for a college president. That’s because Pence
brings a perspective not of an attorney or historian like many college
presidents, but a couple decades of
looking at the books, seeing what
works what doesn’t and where programs are making a difference.
Georgia’s technical colleges graduated nearly 40,000 students last year
and Chattahoochee Tech is among
the largest of the 22 colleges in the
state Technical College System. Like
some of her peers in the system, such
as President Ivan Allen at Central
Georgia Tech, Pence has been with
her school nearly her whole career.
She grew up in Cherokee County,
just across the county line from
Pickens, and earned her bachelor’s
in accounting from the University of
North Georgia in Dahlonega and her
MBA from Reinhardt University in
Waleska— also in the service area for
Chattahoochee Tech.
After a brief stint in the Georgia
Department of Audits and Accounts,
Pence learned of the central role
technical education plays in the
state and began her career in education at Appalachian Technical College, which eventually merged into
Chattahoochee Tech. Much of that
time was in operations. It’s like the
back end of what makes a college
work, making sure the funding is
there, and facilities and technology
are available and working.
“Even when I was in operations,
I worked to make sure I was seeing
the full picture. That’s because any
time you’re funding projects or you’re
working with facilities, if we don’t
remember our end goal— which is to
teach students and get them into the
workforce-- then we’re in trouble,”
said Pence. “So, I worked really hard
to understand all areas of the college.
I’m not a teacher. I’m not a faculty
member. I will never be a faculty
member. That is not my gift. But I
worked to understand that side of the
house, because I had to understand
the academic side and what we were
really doing to fully support them
from an operations standpoint. So,
while my background was never in
academics, I had to make sure that I
knew what was going on in academics to support faculty and students.”
Colleges often say they’re training the workforce of the future. But
from Pence’s perspective, they’re also
training the workforce of today. That’s
because with short term degrees,
certificates and diplomas, technical
colleges can get students out and into
the workforce sometimes as quickly
as eight weeks. “At Chattahoochee,
we love making sure that we have
the workforce ready and available,”
she said. “Georgia is the number one
state to do business, and without the
technical colleges and Chattahoochee
Tech, we would not keep that title.
And that’s because you must have the
workers in order to be the number one
state to do business.”
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