CHARLOTTE -- Nearly 50 years ago, Johnson C. Smith University’s 12th president set foot on the campus, first as a student and then years later at a leader. Now, Dr. Dorothy Cowser Yancy says it is time to say good bye.

Yancy started at JCSU in 1960, and while at first she was homesick, the school would eventually be her home away from home. Upon graduating in 1964, she knew her time at the university was far from over.

"I left here determined to make Johnson C. Smith University proud of me,” said the first woman to ever be the school’s president. "It was different coming back as interim president. I thought I'd be here for maybe six months because … I figured by September I'd be back in the classroom at Georgia Tech and life would continue. I never expected to be here for 14 years."

Now, it’s time for her to leave campus once more.

"I'm going to chapter four in my life,” she said. “I think that everybody should have at least six chapters. I know that my chapters are, I'm 64 so I know that my chapters are going to get shorter and shorter. But I want to have a few more chapters of doing things."

Yancy’s last day is June 30. She plans to move to Atlanta to do consulting work. Dr. Ron Carter will take over the position on July 1.