Dr. Jeff Cox, WCC president and Cindi Sanford.

Cindi Sanford was named the 2018-2019 recipient of the John N. Bennet Scholarship. Sanford is a sophomore in the Radiography program at WCC and will graduate in May 2019.

In 1956, Dr. John N. Bennett, a radiologist at Wilkes General Hospital, had a vision to begin a Radiologic Technologist training program, a rigorous, two-year certificate program that taught students how to be effective radiologic technologists. As the program flourished, the John N. Bennett Endowment Corporation was established on June 8, 1989 to honor Dr. Bennett’s contribution to the profession, as well as the program, by raising funds to be used for the educational and scientific benefit of students, current and preceding, of the hospital-based program.

The Wilkes General Hospital School of Radiologic Technology, later renamed Wilkes Regional Medical Center School of Radiologic Technology, was administered through Wilkes Regional Medical Center from 1956 until June 2013. From the time of its conception in 1956, until June 2013, the program served approximately 319 students. However, due to a change in the American Registry of Radiologic Technology standards, requiring all Radiologic Technologists to have at minimum an associate degree to be eligible to sit for the national registry; the program was transferred to Wilkes Community College. The Wilkes Community College Radiography Program transferred in six currently enrolled WRMC School of Radiologic Technology students and accepted a new cohort of first year students in the Fall of 2013.

In the Spring of 2015, the board of directors for the John N. Bennett Endowment Corporation saw fit to dissolve the corporation and made a donation to Wilkes Community College on December 15, 2015 to fund the John N. Bennett Scholarship for radiography students and to honor the originally intended goals of the John N. Bennett Endowment Corporation.

Members of the previously established John N. Bennett Endowment Fund are: Kristain Miller, Angie Blevins, Dianne Davis, Sharon Absher, and Ruth Adams. Betty Winslow was a consultant.

Contributions to the John N. Bennett Scholarship may be sent to WCC Foundation/John N. Bennett Scholarship Fund, P.O. Box 120, Wilkesboro, NC 28697.