On May 4 at the college’s commencement exercises, Bell Nunnally Senior Counsel Nikki Hurst Gibson received Paul Quinn College’s “President’s Award.” The award was given in recognition of Gibson’s work with the school through her board membership with Duke North Texas and its collaboration with Paul Quinn College to design and implement a mentoring program matching more than 20 current students of Paul Quinn with accomplished Duke alums. This program provides programming, one-on-one mentoring, guidance and training to foster students’ career and professional development, as well as to assists students with their transition to the corporate work environment. (Gibson is a 1980 graduate of Duke.)

Paul Quinn College, founded in 1872, is an HBCU (Historically Black Colleges and Universities) and a private, faith-based, four-year, liberal arts-inspired college based in Dallas. In 2015, the school adopted a new financial model – the “New Urban College Model,” reducing student tuition and fees, with the goal of helping students graduate with less than $10,000 in debt. Paul Quinn is also the only urban “Work College” in the U.S., requiring that all resident students participate in a comprehensive work-learning service program for all four years of enrollment. To learn more about Paul Quinn College, please click here.