Campbell University’s Trust & Wealth Management graduates have helped guide families through The Game of Life for nearly 60 years

By Billy Liggett
Game photography by Ben Brown | Font illustration by Adam Fish

 

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Before Milton Bradley became a name synonymous with board games, he was looking for his first best-seller. In 1860, he came up with The Checkered Game of Life, a game that simulated a person’s journey from young adulthood to retirement and allowed players to make big decisions on college, careers, marriage, children and savings.

One hundred years later, the game was revamped for a new generation, dropping “Checkered” and adding revolutionary elements at the time like a three-dimensional board and a plastic spinner. The object remained the same — finish with the highest net worth and a spot in Millionaire Acres and avoid ending up in the “Poor Farm.”

As in real life, winning requires both making the right choices along the way and a good deal of luck. In Milton Bradley’s game, players don’t have the luxury of having someone advise them of their choices along the way.

In real life, they do.

Just seven years after The Game of Life’s reintroduction to American society in 1960, a small private university in North Carolina launched the nation’s first undergraduate degree in trust and wealth management — the brainchild of Campbell’s third president, Norman Adrian Wiggins, at the time one of the nation’s leading authorities on trust law. Part of the Lundy-Fetterman School of Business, the program is still the only undergraduate program of its kind in the United States, preparing students to serve the financial needs of high net worth clients by managing their assets and by developing and implementing sophisticated tax, financial and estate planning strategies — in other words, “game of life” stuff.

Over the next 20 years, analysts predict the largest transfer of wealth in American history as Baby Boomers — the generation born during the high period of birth rates following World War II — pass their assets (totaling more than $84 trillion) to their children and grandchildren. And as Campbell’s trust program nears its 60th year, it’s still the only program of its kind in the country, and its graduates have never been in more demand.

“This transfer of wealth will be exponentially larger than we ever imagined, and that is just enormous for kids coming through a program like ours,” says Jimmy Witherspoon, director of Campbell’s trust program for nearly 40 years and a notable figure in the industry. “The demand for our graduates is just incredible.”

When Wiggins started the program in 1968 and a year later the Southeastern Trust School (created for trust bankers already in the industry), he saw that demand as well. Wiggins literally wrote the book on the subject in 1965 with “Wills and the Administration of Trusts in North Carolina,” and he knew that if a new generation of bankers was going to successfully navigate the world of wealth management, their education needed to be more specialized.

“In employing our graduates,” Wiggins said from the beginning, “[banks] save much of the time and expense involved in training newcomers to the field to be productive employees in it. Here, we improve the managerial techniques of the trust business. And we help all of the trust industry.”

To learn more, visit trusteducationfoundation.com

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Rebecca Brock had hoped to be there in person. But an unexpected business trip to Florida forced her to deliver her words of wisdom to an auditorium full of Trust Fellows by Zoom on this late October morning.

The senior vice president and fiduciary director of trust for Truist Financial — headquartered in Charlotte and one of the top 10 largest banks in the U.S. with $514 billion in assets — Brock is a member of the Campbell University Board of Trustees. She’s also a longstanding board member of the Trust Education Foundation, which keeps trust professionals informed on critical issues and legislative changes in wealth management.

Brock is also a vocal advocate for both the program and her alma mater as a 1997 trust graduate and a 2001 MBA graduate. And on this day, she’s not letting 600 miles stop her from getting students excited about what’s ahead.

“I look forward to all the great things you get to do,” she said. “You’re ahead of where I was at this time — I didn’t even know what trust was when I got to Campbell. And now look at you … I cannot begin to tell you how incredibly impressed I am with the freshmen in this program. They are a magnificent group of young adults — very bright, warm and caring. All of that is incredibly important when you’re going into the world of trust.”

The “world of trust,” Brock and any graduate of the program will tell you, is far more than managing assets. Graduates realize early in their careers that their work helps people in some of their most critical times of need. As advisors, trust professionals often develop personal relationships with the clients they serve and their families. They’re invited to weddings, graduations and funerals. They’re known just as much for their people skills as their financial expertise.

Via Zoom, Brock shares a story where the relationship building she learned at Campbell came in handy.

“It was my very first client,” she says, “and I was worried they would ask me something that I didn’t know the answer to. I had all these notes, and I read everything I had about 10 times before the meeting. But I also leaned on what I learned at Campbell — to be connected with the client, to make sure I’m being honest with them, to tell them that if I didn’t know an answer, I’d find it and get back to them. I thought that the meeting went OK, but I wasn’t sure.

“Two months later, I sat down in their home and said, ‘I just want to see if there’s anything else I can do to assist you today. I want to know if there’s anything else you need from me.’ And they looked at me and said, ‘We are so glad you’re part of our family. We’ve never worked with someone who made us feel this way.’ So you have to make those connections. They’re coming to you with the things that keep them up at night. They’re putting a lot of trust in you.”

Brock was just one of more than a dozen Campbell trust grads and professionals who took an hour or more out of their Monday morning throughout the semester to speak to students in the Trust Fellows program, born three years ago to better build leadership skills among undergraduates and get them more involved in their school and their community.

In addition to the sessions like Brock’s, Trust Fellows get to take part in the annual Trust Advisors Forum in Pinehurst, take networking trips to leading financial institutions and receive an alumni mentor to turn to for guidance during their four years at Campbell.

“I wish we would have started this program 30 years ago,” says Witherspoon. “These students are required to keep a 3.0 GPA, and they’re assigned these mentors who are there to guide them along the way and answer any questions or address concerns they may have. From this speaker series, I’m absolutely floored at the quality of questions that freshmen are asking six or seven weeks in. The biggest problem we used to have with freshmen is they didn’t really understand what trust was, and now … These kids are absolutely loving it, and they’re seeing right off the bat how big the opportunities are career wise.”

Those opportunities are quite big.

Campbell trust graduates have gone on to careers as trust officers, investment managers, financial planners, corporate attorneys and estate planners. They are CEOs, presidents and vice presidents of large banks and trust corporations. They’re working in large cities all over the country — from Boston to Seattle, San Diego to Miami and points in between. And those aren’t even the biggest selling point.

Over 95 percent of Campbell trust graduates are placed in full-time jobs within a month of graduation, provided, Witherspoon says, they are willing to relocate. Nearly 3,000 Campbell alumni are now working with many of the nation’s premier financial institutions, including Bank of America, Wells Fargo, JP Morgan Chase, Northern Trust COmpany, Truist, BNY Mellon, City National and First Citizens Bank.

And Witherspoon’s favorite statistic — the Wall Street Journal recently published a comprehensive study on the EVA (economic value added) to universities across the nation. The top five schools were all Ivy League — Penn, Princeton, Columbia, MIT and Harvard. The median salary of a Penn graduate is $116,000 a year, 10 years after graduation. A recent Lundy-Fetterman School of Business study found the median salary of a Campbell trust graduate is $150,000 in that same span and $212,000 20 year after graduation.

“It’s an eye-popping number,” Witherspoon says, smiling. “And, you know, that catches the attention of not only the students, but their parents, too.”

Yet, Campbell’s trust program remains the only four-year undergraduate program of its kind in the U.S. Some colleges and universities offer certificate programs and trust concentrations, but Campbell remains a unicorn in the field. And there’s a very good explanation for that, according to Tyler Britton, a 2014 law graduate and the director of Campbell’s Master of Trust & Wealth Management graduate program.

“No other school could build the machine we have,” says Britton. “The network we’ve built and the Trust Education Foundation are the result of 50-plus years of experience in the industry and 50-plus years of putting our graduates out into the field. Our students are recognized in this industry. Hiring managers know Campbell grads are ready to hit the ground running. I had an executive from Wells Fargo tell me, ‘It takes us six months to explain to [new hires] what a trust is and what we’re doing here. But we can take a Campbell student, and they’re ready on Day 1, the minute they walk through that door.’”

The machine got its first parts when Wiggins — in one of his first large-scale acts as president — started the trust program Campbell and the summer Southeaster Trust School (now the Trust Advisors Institute) for bankers already in the industry. It received its engine when the Trust Education Foundation Inc. was formed to support the program.

The Southeastern Trust School, according to its charter dean, I. Lee Parker, was born from the North Carolina Bankers Association, which saw a need for more specialized personnel to manage the region’s wealth. Parker chose Campbell College because of Wiggins, whom he called “highly regarded nationally as one of trust’s strongest individuals [and] a devout student of the dean of trustmen, the late Gilbert Stephenson [who died shortly after the school’s launch].”

“We wanted to be near Norman,” Parker wrote in 1972. “We wanted the benefit of his counsel in the formation of the school, the design of its curriculum and the fulfillment of its total process and objective.”

Nine students were among the first graduates of Campbell’s trust program on June 5, 1970. Two years later, 48 trust professionals became the first graduates of the Southeastern Trust School.

The Trust Education Foundation Inc. supports Campbell’s program by providing curriculum oversight to ensure students are exposed to cutting edge instruction and current industry trends. It provides scholarship aid to Campbell students and assists in the marketing of the program to financial institutions nationwide. The Foundation’s flagship program is the annual Trust Advisors Forum, held in February at Pinehurst Resort. The multi-day conference draws more than 300 trust officers from 38 states — making it the nation’s foremost gathering for trust professionals.

“We give our students direct access to mentors through our Trust Fellows Program, and these aren’t just recent graduates,” Britton says. “They are heads of trust departments. Senior vice presidents. These are people at the top of their game. How many programs can you say have the ability to connect students with professionals at the top of the industry. In trust, it’s something only Campbell can do.”

To learn more, visit trusteducationfoundation.com

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It used to be, very few students in Campbell’s trust program came to Campbell originally to study trust, or even business. To build his program over the last 42 years, Witherspoon — or “Spoon,” as he’s known in trust circles — has had to recruit for his program much like a coach.

Gene Lewis’ Campbell trust story began with a talk with Spoon. His sister was already a Campbell student, and she introduced him to “The Godfather” (another of his nicknames in the program) shortly after he arrived on campus.

“I came in with the intentions of studying business, but as Jimmy described what trust is and what the program was about, it resonated with me,” Lewis recalls. “Not because of the job opportunities, necessarily, but really it was more of the fiduciary [the relationship between a trustee and a beneficiary] component of it all — the concept of having others be the priority. It just seemed like a natural fit for me.”

Lewis earned his degree from Campbell in 1994 and landed a job with First Citizens bank as a relationship manager the following January. He began to climb the ladder within First Citizens, becoming a manager of retirement plan services, senior vice president for institutional services and, in 2013, senior vice president and manager of the Trust Division and Wealth Operations. In 2021, he left First Citizens after nearly 27 years to become senior vice president for wealth management at UBS Totalis Wealth Consulting.

He attributes his career and his success to his education at Campbell. In 2017, he joined the Board of Directors for the School of Business, and in 2019, he was named to the University’s Board of Trustees. He became chairman of the board in 2024 and was chair of the search committee that this year chose Dr. William Downs as Campbell’s sixth president, starting this summer. He says he doesn’t view his service to Campbell in the last eight years as an obligation, but more as an opportunity to give back to an institution that “means a great deal” to him.

“I tell people all the time, ‘Campbell is a school of opportunity,’” he says. “I look at myself as a great example. I came here with no real purpose, and Campbell gave me a purpose. It helped me find where I could fit in in this enormous society, even as an average student. I don’t know that you could replicate that at [some of the state’s larger schools] — they’re all wonderful universities, but I don’t think it would have been the same.”

Lewis calls trust a relationship-driven business, one that aligns well with his “extrovert” personality. In his career, he’s worked with generations of families, and he calls it a privilege to have developed relationships with those families along the way. At USB, he advises and manages the trusts for high net-worth families — his job requires a lot of asset management and investment work.

He’s even had to, on several occasions, take on the role of “therapist.”

“I think there are a lot of folks in this world who believe that money solves all problems, and the reality is that, yes, it can solve a lot of financial problems. But it also brings on a host of other problems,” Lewis says.

“Even the most high-functioning, affluent family has its share of issues. Wealth in a family can be a complication — a good complication, but it’s not something we take lightly. We spend a lot of time in multi-generational planning, in financial literacy and in helping the next generation understand what it means to manage wealth. There’s an enormous responsibility that comes with that, there’s stewardship that comes with it, and there’s philanthropy that comes with it. It’s not just about how you cash a check, how you spend your money or how many homes you have. You have a responsibility to pay it forward, and most of our clients truly see it that way.”

Mary Lytch was drawn to trust because she, too, wanted to make a difference in the lives of her clients and the generations that follow. A 2000 trust graduate, Lytch says she grew up in a family of entrepreneurs, each of them with a community-driven spirit. The work they did professionally helped others, she says, and they also took time out of their personal lives to serve others through nonprofit endeavors.

She chose Campbell University originally for its pharmacy program. After very quickly realizing that wasn’t the career path for her, Lytch met Witherspoon and got “the pitch.” After her first fiduciary law class, she was hooked. She landed her first job as a trust officer with SouthTrust Bank in Charlotte just days after graduation, and 25 years later, she’s Carolinas President of Trust & Wealth for Park National Bank in Charlotte, a position she’s held for just over a year.

Even at the top of the profession, Lytch, like Lewis, says trust is still about relationships.

“Finances are personal. Family is personal. You’re making a meaningful impact on someone’s legacy, on their family or financial goals, and seeing the results of that support is incredibly rewarding,” Lytch says. “It’s fulfilling to know that what I do helps others achieve their goals and has lasting value. You do become part of their families, because, like the name suggests, they literally trust you with everything.”

All of what she loves about her career, Lytch says, was spelled out to her by Witherspoon back when she was an aimless freshman who thought she wanted to study pharmacy. She caught up with Witherspoon at a recent Trust Advisors Forum, and he let her in on a little secret about those trust pitches he’s become so known for.

“We’ve always joked that he has a knack for just luring you in, but he told me he doesn’t just recruit anyone,” Lytch says. “He said, ‘There are certain qualities that I look for in students to know whether or not they would excel in this career. I can tell early on if they’d be good at advising clients.’ So, yes, it was really special to hear that he hand-picks students, and it was heartwarming to know he saw something in me and my fellow classmates.”

Trust & Wealth Management at Campbell has grown since Lewis’ and Lytch’s undergrad days in the early and late 90s. The program graduates between 50 and 60 trust professionals a year, and the School of Business’ new Master of Trust & Wealth Management degree program brings in another 25 to 30 students per cohort each fall.

Megan Harwood didn’t need an elevator speech or a talk with Witherspoon to pique her interest in the program. She originally chose Campbell for its business pre-law program, but she discovered trust during her admissions process. While she still has her career ahead of her, she’s received a taste of what the career has to offer through her internship experience this past summer for Cumberland Trust in Nashville, Tennessee.

Living in a new state and on her own for the first time offered valuable life experience, in addition to the important hands-on experience she received at Cumberland. 

“I learned a lot about myself — learned that I can do things on my own,” Harwood says. “I think it’s beneficial for any woman to get out there on your own. It can be scary at first, but it’s fun. As much as I’m growing professionally, I’m growing personally, too.”

In Nashville, Harwood saw a place where she could see herself living one day. The other draw was Cumberland Trust, a company whose CEO and president is a woman and whose workforce is 75-percent women. “One of my biggest fears coming into corporate America as a woman was the idea that I was entering a male-dominated field,” she says. “When I learned about the number of women who lead and work at Cumberland during my interview, I was sold. I love it. And they made the entire interview process as natural and comfortable as possible. Everything just kind of aligned perfectly for me.”

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It’s hard to imagine Campbell University’s trust program without Jimmy Witherspoon. When he earned his trust degree in 1980, he was one of only two students in the class. Events like Pinehurst’s annual Trust Advisor Forum show just how much the program has flourished under his leadership.

“We started the Forum 34 years ago, and back then, it was just a small event held on campus with a few speakers,” he says. “Today, it’s just grown so much. I can’t imagine there are many academic programs that can put on something like this. And of course, the money it makes goes to scholarship funds, so not only does this event get our name out there in the industry, it benefits our kids, too.”

Witherspoon isn’t ready for any big announcements about his own retirement, but the wheels have been put in motion to ready his program for the day in the not-so-distant future when he does leave it in someone else’s hands. That someone else appears to be 2011 Campbell trust graduate and 2014 Campbell law graduate Tyler Britton, currently an assistant professor and director of the Master of Trust & Wealth Management program.

Britton was running his own law firm when he got a different kind of pitch from Witherspoon.

“He called me up one day and told me they had a professor retiring,” he recalls. “And I said, ‘Oh, that’s interesting.’ He asked if I’d ever thought about teaching, to which I said, ‘No, not really.’ I remember being a tutor for several business classes when I was a student, but I never thought about doing it full time. But I said yes, and I’m glad I did. In fact, I thank God every day that I did.”

Britton is quick to tout the new Master of Trust & Wealth Management program, designed for students who didn’t study trust as undergrads but have a desire to enter the field. The program’s graduates are eligible to take the exams for the nation’s leading three trust professional certifications, and like the undergrad program, 95 percent of its students are placed in full-time jobs within a month of earning their degree. The program is also available online, and students from all over the country are currently working toward a Campbell trust degree.

“The master’s program is tough, but the material we go over is relevant in the industry,” Britton says. “We’ve built current events and trends into the program. We’ve hired faculty who are in step with changes in the industry — for example, crypto and other digital currency. I think we’ve built a really solid program, and I’m excited to see it continue to grow and evolve.”

The School of Business’ recent launch of the Risk Management Institute, designed to educate and prepare students for the insurance industry, also presents an opportunity for the trust program, Britton says, with potential for integration of classes and possible insurance certifications within a trust degree. Britton also addresses the topic affecting just about every major and career field on campus — artificial intelligence. While it is creeping into segments of the industry, it will never replace the “human touch” of a trust advisor, he says.

“Say I have $50 million, and I call up Wells Fargo … I don’t want to talk to a computer. I want a personalized experience. AI can take over some of the quantitative aspects of the industry, but there’s still that personal relationship you develop with your client that can’t be replicated.”

The future of Campbell University’s one-of-a-kind Trust & Wealth Management program is bright as it nears its 60th year. The demand is high for professionals in the field, and Campbell has managed to connect its growing, service-minded alumni base with its growing student body through mentorship programs and annual gatherings.

In addition to the historic transfer of wealth expected over the next 20 years, the industry is also seeing a large percentage of its workforce retiring over the next five years. According to Gene Lewis, the entire banking industry is hungry for young professionals.

There hasn’t been a better time to study trust, he says.

“You just don’t see a lot of young people anymore saying, ‘I want to put on a suit every day and be a banker.’ It’s rare,” he says. “We have more millionaires and billionaires in this country than we’ve ever had, so the demand for professional, constructive wealth management is high. And there’s an enormous void in this business for talent. Campbell has put itself in a really unique position to fill this void.”

To learn more, visit trusteducationfoundation.com