Virginia’s House Speaker Don Scott Honors Black History Month with Inspiring Address

Tidewater Community College’s Student Life Committee closed Black History Month 2025 on Wednesday afternoon, February 26 at the Portsmouth Campus Student Center. The Virginia Speaker of the House, Don Scott, served as the keynote speaker to discuss workforce development and shared his story of his rise to earning a spot in the Virginia House of Delegates. TCC students, faculty, staff, and the public were invited to attend the keynote speaker presentation, “African Americans and Labor: Resilience, Innovation, and Empowerment” which included a networking lunch.

TCC’s Associate Vice President for Professional Development Solutions with Workforce Solutions, Kodi Fleming, was onstage with Speaker Scott to discuss workforce development and the industry within our area. Speaker Scott said he is pushing for paid internships and workforce employees’ access to quality training. He praised TCC for providing resources and opportunities for people to earn a certification and go into the workforce with skills that can help them succeed in multiple fields.

In Scott’s keynote speech, he shared about his upbringing with his single mother and siblings in Houston, Texas. Scott attended Texas A&M University and graduated with a degree in agriculture. After earning his undergraduate degree, he served as a naval officer on the destroyer USS John Hancock. In 1994, he earned a law degree from Louisiana State University, hoping to continue into the legal world.

Around that time, Scott said he had many struggles and challenges which led him to serving time in prison. Throughout that time, he reconnected with his faith and felt guided in a better direction.

Scott said he cherishes the workforce development programs. His first job after prison was welding. In 2002, Scott joined the KRA Corporation, a workforce development company, working in case management followed by a promotion a year later to project manager. In 2005, Scott moved from Philadelphia, where he and his wife originally resided, to the Hampton Roads area. At that point, he was running the project and serving as the senior vice president at the firm.

In that decade, Scott addressed this part of his life as the period of “resilience” as he worked his way through a difficult time of his life, regaining his strength and identity as a person.

Scott spoke on how he reached a point where he wanted to be able to use his law degree and skills to contribute to making change in society. In 2014, he passed the Virginia bar exam and was licensed as an attorney in 2015. He opened his own firm where he took on criminal defense, family law, and civil cases. In 2022, Scott partnered with Breit Biniazan Trial Lawyers.

Scott said that “it’s easy to have a pity party” but people can “redefine” themselves like he did. He called this “innovation” because he was able to make a new name and story for himself.

Eventually, Scott stepped into politics. He ran in 2019 for the House of Delegates to represent the city of Portsmouth. He served as the minority leader from 2022 to 2024. In 2023, Scott was nominated unanimously by his caucus and became the first black Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates in history.

“Politics don’t matter, humanity is what matters,” Scott said.

In his time in politics, he has advocated for many important causes including criminal justice reform, economic development, affordable healthcare, and public education.

Scott spoke on “empowerment” as the last message to the TCC community. He encouraged people to speak up and not to be afraid to be their authentic self.

“People need to use their voice to speak up. Representation matters,” Scott said.

Women should consider a future in funeral service industry. Just ask alumna Sterling Oliver

Sterling Oliver is accustomed to the surprise she is frequently met with when she walks into a room where a family is grieving. The 26-year-old, named for her great, great grandfather, the founder of H.D. Oliver Funeral Apartments, does not fit the stereotypical image of a funeral director.

But her education, which includes earning an Associate of Applied Science in Funeral Service from Tidewater Community College, along with her genuine warmth make her more than capable of handling the plethora of details that accompany the loss of a loved one.

“You think you’re doing such a minute thing, but you can be making a huge difference to someone,” said Oliver, seated in the parlor of H.D. Oliver Funeral Apartments in Ghent. “Growing up, I loved event planning – taking complete chaos of what life is and at least making some kind of good out of it. It’s really about service and that individual person sitting in that room and what they need in that moment.”

Sterling is the daughter of Martin Oliver, owner of the family business that also includes Chesapeake and Virginia Beach locations. The company dates back to 1865, when the original Sterling T. Oliver built caskets during the Civil War. Five generations later, Sterling is immersed in what will one day be a business she and her cousin, HD, will run together.

Funeral service is a career she was born into having watched her father keep irregular hours to service a family in need. Neither parent pushed her to follow the path – “In fact, they insisted I go to college first,” said the Maury High School graduate.

Oliver earned her bachelor’s in communication with a specialization in event planning and minor in anthropology from Longwood University. She values the communication skills she gained there, as funeral service is not about working with dead bodies.

“You’ve got to know how to read people,” she said. “Eighty percent of this job is dealing with people and dealing with them at their lowest point.”

After Longwood, TCC became the next step. She considered following her father’s path and attending the nationally renowned Gupton-Jones College of Funeral Service in Atlanta but found an equivalent program at TCC at more than half the cost.

“It was more cost effective; I didn’t have to pay to live in Georgia. I could stay here,” said Oliver, who owns a house in Larchmont. “TCC started as convenience, and it ended up being a better plan.”

TCC’s 67-credit program combines technical education with business skills under the direction of program head Frank Walton, a funeral service practitioner for more than 25 years, and Kim Jones, associate professor of funeral service who specializes in teaching the sciences.

Having come from a small liberal arts college that was close knit, Oliver didn’t expect the same at TCC given its size. “I was prepared to have this impersonal experience, but I was proved wrong,” she said.

Walton and Jones remain mentors who impressed her with lively class discussion and quick responses to all her questions.

“Sterling’s outstanding personality and humble demeanor made her a favorite among both faculty and students during her time at TCC,” Walton said. “She is empathic, extremely bright and as such, well-poised to contribute to the rich tradition of her family’s firm.”

Last May Oliver graduated and is finishing up her apprenticeship, the final step in the program. She will take her state certification exam this summer to be a licensed funeral director.

Oliver would like to see more women consider a funeral service career. She works under TCC alumna Angela Gagne, the first female funeral director in H.D. Oliver history. What used to be a male-dominated industry has increasingly tilted toward women. While only 16 percent of all National Funeral Directors Association members are women, today, nearly 60 percent of mortuary science students are female.

“If you’re good at this, it’s a good income for you and your family. But it takes work, your heart and time. It’s not about driving the big Cadillac or wearing a suit. It’s about raw family emotion and they need you. And they might need you at 2 a.m. You never are going to fix the pain they have, but you can soften the blow.”

For information about TCC’s funeral service program, contact Walton at jwalton@tcc.edu.