My Vicarious Life: November 2012

What I Want Now

November 12, 2012

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The Master Mentor: Dr. Alvetta Peterman Thomas

Dr. Alvetta Peterman Thomas November 02, 2012

By Katrice

Dr. Alvetta Peterman Thomas, president of Atlanta Technical College, is not your typical college president. Well, I should say, not like any college president I've ever met. She's accessible, but not in a politician type of way ... really accessible. If you meet her in passing, she will engage you and you'll feel as if you've known her for a while. And when you see her again, she will receive you in that vein. Hint: Dr. Alvetta invests herself in people; Not because of what she does but because of who she is. She told me, in our first meeting, that she believed in mentoring. But, having been with her for just an hour, I already knew it.

This series would not be complete without a conversation with her.

Where did it all begin for you? Did you always know you wanted to be a college president?

I didn't always know I was going to be a college president. That's one of the things I always thought was unique about my story, but the more I tell my story … I find out it's not so unique. I started out in life thinking I was going to be an attorney. But because I was going to have to go to law school in the northeast in order to have it paid for, I wasn't going to a cold weather climate. And for me to allow climate to shift my career goal means that I wasn't that committed to it anyway. So, I was kind of unsure of what I wanted to do.

I took a very indirect route to becoming a president. I've worked as an archivist, as a writer/editor for a military magazine ... I've taught school but there were a number of things that put me in a great position to be where I am today. What I think put me in the best position for presidency was when I landed a job with the U.S. Army Department of Defense as an education specialist. In that job, I reviewed curriculum and developed curriculum for army training programs. That kind of set the stage. And [from there] as I moved around the country, the jobs I got were in various phases of education; all of those experiences combined put me in the places where I could be a college president. As I was going through those things, I didn't realize it. I didn't decide I could be president of a college until about five or 10 years ago. Having a great mentor who was president of this college made me realize that I could be president. In fact, she told me that I could be president before I even thought about it … Once she told me, she kind of spoke power into it. I'm here successfully because a lot of people mentored me along the way, not just my predecessor.

From my coming to know you through Atlanta Tribune coverage, you've always talked about mentoring. Is it because you were mentored at every step that it organically became a profound tenet for you or have you always had a mind for mentoring?

I've always been the type of person who likes to help others. So, because of that, mentoring is natural to me. But, having so many people mentor me, I developed a greater appreciation for it as being important. There's a lot of research out there about mentoring and the importance of it … and why we should give back what has been given to us.

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What I Want Now

The Master Mentor: Dr. Alvetta Peterman Thomas

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