This weekend in Winston-Salem, Carver High School will celebrate its 90th anniversary. It was the first school to serve Black students outside of the city limits, and it has remained a major source of pride in the community since opening its doors in 1936.
This Saturday, October 9, the Sound of the Swarm Marching Band will entertain the crowd during Carver’s Homecoming football game. Eighty-two-year-old Wilbert Rice will be there. He and his 14 siblings went to school here.
Looking out over the grassy field, Rice smiles as the memories come back to him. He says that when he was a student, they used to have mud bowls because back then all around the fifty-yard line was nothing but red clay.
"Well, this field is where we won our first high school championship football game," says Rice. "Out here on this field right here. Yes, sir, we beat Elizabeth City, yeah, out of Elizabeth City. It was 34 to 2 right out here on this field."
Rice was a running back, defensive back and captain of the football team for the Yellow Jackets that year, 1962, and he says he hasn’t missed a home game since. He went on to play college ball at what is today North Carolina Central University.
Back at his home on Carver High School Road, Rice continues to reflect on his early experiences at the nearby school. He credits his success on and off the field to his coach David Lash.
"He was a man that you know, oh, good gracious, you know he had control over whatever was going on," he says. "He taught us to be men. You know, we grew up to be —I mean, in other words, getting us ready for life, dealing with the people outside of high school and college. Like you win and lose some in the games, like you win and lose some in life."
After college, Rice went on to work for Reynolds Tobacco for 36 years and raised a family.
His daughter, Chevelle Rice, is a first-grade teacher at a nearby local academy. She grew up in Winston-Salem, surrounded by Carver High lore and desperately wanted to attend. The school district's integration efforts of the 1970s made that impossible for her, but she says she was determined that each of her five children would follow in her dad’s footsteps.
"When you go to a predominantly Black school, you're not just a number," says Rice. "You are truly a person, and the people that are there, they care, and they're there because they want to be there, and they know — they feel that. When a child feels the love, there's nothing that they cannot accomplish."
Today, about 95% of Carver’s student body is Black or Hispanic and nearly all those enrolled are economically disadvantaged. Last year’s graduation rate was 69% — below the district and state averages. Rice’s daughter Christina Jones excelled academically and graduated in 2019. She says the images of Carver that come to her mind run counter to the disadvantaged narrative.
"I think of Black excellence, culture, so to speak, and knowing what other people don't know about Carver," she says. "And that is a lot of smart students, a lot of really high GPAs, a lot of things that you wouldn't really hear as much. Carver is really a gem that a lot of people will have to dig to discover."
When asked what images come to mind at the word "Carver," Christina's brother (Class of 2007), Will Miller, is quick to answer: "Blood, family, hard workers, community and of course, Black, he says. "Another thing that comes to my mind is football."
Like his father, Rev. Herbert Miller, and his grandfather before him, Miller was a star high school football player who went on to play college ball. Today, Miller is Dean of Students at the Quality Education Academy, where he mentors young students with behavioral issues.
He says his own challenges at Carver prepared him well.
"My folder was about as thick as an encyclopedia," says Miller. "I had a lot of write-ups. I went to ISS a lot. So, the kids that I deal with was me. So it's basically I'm dealing with myself 20 years ago. So, what I tell my kids all the time is, I understand what you're going through because it wasn't just too long ago, I was a kid, and I have not forgotten. So that's one of my biggest tools: never forgetting."
Miller says for him, legacy means everything. He’s been connected to Carver since the day he was born and has no intention of ever forgetting his roots.
"Once you graduate from Carver, the family aspect of it never ends, and to show proof of that, if you come to the game, homecoming October 9, that's on my birthday, you will see that nobody in the land does it like Carver," he says. "And we can show y’all how them Jackets get down."
"United in Pride. Built on Tradition. Ready for the Future" is the school’s motto. It will be on full display during Carver’s 90th anniversary celebration at David Lash Stadium in Winston-Salem.