Inez Norwood Fridley . . . People and projects

Biographical sketch of Inez Fridley. This and other articles may be found in the University Archives.

The citation for this article is: "Inez Norwood Fridley . . . People and projects," Pieces of Eight, March 1, 1986.

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Inez Fridley gambled her first post-college job interview to attend a rock concert.

"A group of us were going to drive down from Richmond to Virginia Beach," she said. "We had tickets in the fourth row -- it was the Supremes! No way was I going to miss that!"

Luckily, her potential employers agreed to re-schedule the interview; she went to the Supremes concert, then presented herself for the postponed interview and was hired on the spot to be East Carolina's youngest dormitory counselor.

"They told me the minimum age for this job was 28, but that I could have a one-year appointment," she recalls. "I hardly knew where Greenville was then, but I liked the idea of being able to go on to grad school while working, so coming to East Carolina seemed like a good thing to do."

At 22, the youngest person ever hired to work with students, Inez Fridley found herself an odd number indeed among her co-workers, chiefly women in their late fifties and older. Residence counselors were then, quite appropriately, called "housemothers." Fridley, by contrast, must have seemed a friendly sister to the girls in her charge.

Originally planning to teach high school English and history, Fridley knew she "wanted to interact with young people." There was a terrible surplus of teachers then, 30 people for every teaching job. I had never dreamed I would be making an impact on young people in quite this way. Actually, coming here, to begin this career, has been one of a long series of fortunate accidents that has directed my life," she said.

New World

It was quickly apparent that beginning a career in residence hall administration was the right thing for this energetic young woman. She undertook master's degree studies in guidance and counseling and was able -- with just a twinge of ironic regret -- to turn down a couple teaching offers. Her work was a whole new world indeed; a commuter student at Virginia Commonwealth University, she had never lived in a college residence hall.

Now, one of three area coordinators in the Department of Residence Life, Fridley has found immense fulfillment in her work with students. "My own circumstances were a good example of how students can develop," she said.

"When I came here, I felt really out of place. I had to make my own contacts and connections on campus. This is the process students experience; it's so easy to stay in your own milieu, but you don't grow that way. It helps to be put in a new system and have to make your way in it."

Incredibly, Fridley was quite uninterested in activism during her girlhood in Richmond. That changed when she moved south. She has been president of the local chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW), an executive board member for REAL Crisis Intervention Center, a delegate for county and regional Democratic Party conventions, state treasurer for the N.C. Association of Women Denas and Counselors and an alumna leader for her sorority, Sigma Sigma Sigma.

Involvement in interesting projects has made her life "meaningful," she says. As circumstances shift she has "by accident" come into new situations, new groups of people and new focuses for her effort and talents. She'd like to impart to her students a similar readiness to accept challenges and become involved and thus develop themselves.

"We feel that our programs supplement the classroom in the student's development," she said. "We try to offer them chances for social, cultural and recreational enrichment. What's really rewarding is to see students grasp something for the first time, some new idea or concept. It's as if a light bulb turns on inside their heads; they say, 'I understand now; I made a connection.' That's what life is all about. That's what this job is all about."

This winter Fridley and her colleagues have arranged a variety of dorm-based programs, including information sessions on such serious issues as date-rape and alcohol abuse, exhibitions for Black History Month and -- purely for fun -- "Dating Game" evenings.

"Everybody has fun at the 'Dating Game'; they all win prizes, even though they usually don't really go on the dates later," she said with a smile. "We also have films and rap sessions on all kinds of topics."

Contact and Feedback

Fridley's office in College Hill's Tyler Dormitory -- the most imposing of the cluster of five residence halls she oversees -- is a central connecting point for a lot of the activity she and her co-workers generate. A prime reward of her work, in her own view, is being in close contact with the students she serves. "Seeing them every day, we get a log of feedback to what we're doing," she said. "That can be a problem in some jobs -- you don't know how well you're doing because you don't get feedback. The feedback we get is what keeps us honest."

She is amused to recall that her career here was supposed to be a temporary one. The administration did extend her original one year, but for the first five years, she was always poised to move on, to a "bigger place."

"Now, I actually prefer the rural environment, the small city atmosphere," she said. "I'm really opposed to extremely rapid growth, to unplanned growth, the kind of growth that happens without ethics, the kind that has more to do with dollars and cents than human values. That is totally abhorrent to me."

Concern about her adopted city has led Fridley into active roles in policy-making processes. She has served on the Mayor's Committee on the Status of Women and chaired the city's Environmental Advisory Commission. Most recently, she became the first East Carolina female to be elected to the Greenville City Council, winning handily on her first try at an elective position in government.

Fridley and her vocational rehabilitation counselor husband, John Anema, were founders of the Tar River Neighborhood Association, a group of northeast Greenville residents who have made a significant impact on reform of city codes. TRNA work taught her a great deal, she said. "In a capsule, we have had growth problems, planning problems. This is the area that gets the biggest impact of the campus, of the downtown revitalization," she explained.

A Plethora of Owls

With husband John, with whom she shares a mutual "best friend" relationship, Fridley has led Sierra Club clean-up expeditions on the Tar River. Since the owl is a symbol oten associated with environmentalists, one naturally assumes that this is why Inez Fridley has surrounded herself with owls.

Owls in paintings, sculptures, figurines; owls large and small; owls of various textures and hues abound on every surface, every wall. Owls became her "trademark," she says, "quite by accident."

"I used to date a guy who was always spouting that little verse about the 'wise old owl who sat in an oak,'" she said. "To tease me, my sisters used to put owls in my room. Later on, other people saw them and assumed that I was an owl collector."

Many of the owls she owns, more than 300 in all, are keepsakes of favorite people who gave them to her. A speical one is the owl painting hanging above her desk in Tyler. "This was a gift from one of my students, a boy who had muscular dystrophy," she explained. "I remember when he brought it in here one day; he said, "Here. I thought you needed another one."