Mrs. Janice Hawkins
Troy University's First Lady

            Janice Hawkins’ career has been marked by a strong commitment to education and public service in her roles as both Troy University’s first lady and as teacher of the visually impaired.

            As first lady of the University, Mrs. Hawkins has played leadership roles in a wide variety of areas. Her vision has added luster to an already beautiful campus. For example, when the university purchased property that had been a Baptist Children’s Home, Mrs. Hawkins was instrumental in helping convert it into houses for five sororities at TROY. She was also the driving force behind the rose garden that complements the beauty of TROY’s main Quad area.

            One of the University’s first alumni travel-abroad programs began with a trip to Ireland, the land of Mrs. Hawkins’ heritage as her minister father grew up there. She was  the backbone of the origins of the Troy University Irish Celebration held annually in conjunction with  Spring Reunion. 

            Mrs. Hawkins also enjoys working with students at TROY to develop leadership skills. Each year she holds a special etiquette training class for students enrolled in the Capstone Honors Program. Mrs. Hawkins helps prepare these students for life after college by teaching the proper behavior at formal banquets and other official functions.

            Her role as mentor and friend extends to TROY’s growing international student population. The Hawkins family “adopts” an international student each year to serve as a surrogate family, thus easing the transition to life in the southern United States. Dr. and Mrs. Hawkins host all graduating seniors and their parents to a breakfast in their home on the day of the ceremony, in addition to numerous other occasions that they open their home to special visitors.  She also helps to oversee the Davis Theatre for the Performing Arts’ subscription season production shows.

            Our first lady has had a rewarding lifetime career working with the blind and visually impaired.  She continues serving in that area with the State Department of Education as a Specialist for Vision Impairment and Blindness, as well as a Specialist for the State Improvement Grant for the activities with the Alabama higher education institutions.  She serves on a number of boards, including the Board of Directors of the Alabama Board of Transliterators for Interpreters for the Deaf, Alabama Historical Commission, the Alabama Humanities Foundation, the Davis Theatre for the Performing Arts, the N.A.L.L. Foundation, as well as other state and community boards.  In addition, Mrs. Hawkins gives presentations nationally on the education of the blind and visually impaired.

            She earned a Bachelor of Science degree from David Lipscomb College with a major in Social Work and Home Economics and a Master of  Science from the University of Alabama in Birmingham with a major in Special Education for the Multiple Disabled with Emphasis on the Visually Impaired.  She also has completed postgraduate courses.

            She and Chancellor Hawkins are  most proud of their two daughters.  Katherine “Katie” Hawkins Beall, who graduated from TROY in May 2002 and was commissioned into the active duty United States Air Force as an Intelligence Officer, is now stationed with her husband who is serving in the active duty Air Force at the Joint Intelligence Operations Center, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii as an Intelligence Officer.  She is enrolled in the Troy University master’s program online.  Kelly Burns Hawkins, who graduated from TROY in 2002, is currently a law student at Regent University in Virginia Beach, VA.  Her area of interest in the Law is children’s advocacy.  She was instrumental in the passing of the 2001 Alabama law which makes clergy mandatory reporters of child abuse.  She is a former Miss TROY and twice a first  runner-up in the Miss Alabama Pageant.