Dr. Della Vanhuss to Retire June 2
Press Release
Date: May 9, 2025
Contact: Lisa Garrett, lgarrett@tctc.edu
Dr. Della Vanhuss to Retire June 2
PENDLETON --- For nearly three decades, Dr. Della Vanhuss has encountered Tri-County Technical College graduates just about everywhere she goes - the local post office, area schools, the grocery store and even TCTC – when former students, like Hubert McClure and Andrea Barnett, returned as fellow instructors in the Arts and Sciences Division.
After 27 years of teaching history courses, and 24 years as humanities department head, Dr. Vanhuss has decided to retire.
“In addition to gardening and traveling, I plan to rest and relax– and sleep in,” she said.
Her last day at TCTC will be June 2.
After working as an adjunct for four years, Dr. Vanhuss was hired in 1998 as department head for humanities for the Arts and Sciences Division, where she taught history and other humanities courses.
She says the people at TCTC - co-workers and the students in her classes and those who she met while serving as Alpha Zeta Beta advisor - made TCTC a great place to work. Dr. Vanhuss said she especially enjoyed teaching “the non-traditional evening students, many of whom started and/or finished their degrees at TCTC. That is so exciting to see.”
TCTC mathematics instructor Andrea Barnett is one of those non-traditional students Dr. Vanhuss taught when she was working as an adjunct. At the time, Barnett was a married mother of two young children and working a full-time job while returning to school after a 10-year hiatus. She admits she was dreading the Western Civilization class. “But Della made it interesting. I left the class with a deeper appreciation of the material and even signed up for Della’s class for the second part of World Civ. It has been a long time since I had taken a history class, but this time it was very interesting. And that’s because Della is well versed in the subject matter. Also, she challenged me and I appreciated that. I saw how much Della loves the subject she teaches and I admired that. So I when I started teaching math, a subject that some students fear, I modeled her approach by finding new ways to make math interesting for people like she did the history class for me. Della is professional, positive, and easy to talk to, and I’m really going to miss her.”
Hubert McClure, a TCTC alumnus and longtime math instructor in the Arts and Sciences Division, was one of those students who enrolled in a Western Civilization class taught by Dr. Vanhuss in the evening. (He had transferred to Clemson University and was fulfilling history requirements at TCTC.) McClure says Dr. Vanhuss falls into the category of “a great teacher, someone you never forget.”
McClure vividly remembers being a student in Vanhuss’s Western Civilization evening class. “Della teaches from the heart. She doesn’t present; she teaches. She made history come to life.”
He admits he initially wasn’t interested in the subject matter as a 20-year-old (then) Civil Engineering major, but he says, “Della and my Western Civilization II teacher, Dr. Belcher, made the class go from a requirement to something I enjoyed. I remember Della’s extensive knowledge, along with her sense of humor and her laugh. Her knowledge of history is impressive. Her class was such a good experience, and I remember a lot of the material to this day.”
“Della has a remarkable ability to see the good in people and to bring out their best,” said Corey Evans, Spanish instructor at TCTC. “She hired me into my first full-time role, and her belief in me—and in so many others—has shaped careers and changed lives. Her steady presence, unwavering support, and deep commitment to our students and our mission will be felt for years to come.”
Jennifer Hulehan, dean of TCTC’s Arts and Sciences Division, said, “Della has always done the right thing, for the right people, for the right reasons. She’s the person you go to when you don’t know what to do—because you know she’ll guide you with wisdom, grace, and a sense of humor. I’ll always be grateful for the way she took me under her wing when I first stepped into leadership. She made this College better, and she made all of us better, too.”
About Tri-County Technical College
Tri-County Technical College, a public two-year community and technical college serving Anderson, Oconee and Pickens Counties in South Carolina, enrolls more than 9,000 students annually and offers more than 70 major fields of study, including computer technology, industrial electronics, mechatronics, nursing, and university transfer programs. Tri-County boasts the highest student success rate among two-year colleges in the state and ranks in the top one percent nationally for successful student transfers to four-year colleges and universities. To learn more, visit tctc.edu.
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