Stephen W. Wood

For other people of the same name, see Steve Wood (disambiguation).

Stephen Wray Wood served as a Republican member of the North Carolina General Assembly[1] representing the state's sixty-first House district, including constituents in Guilford county. Wood served eight terms in the State House from 1984–2005. Before election to the NC House he served as Professor of History and Education and Assistant Academic Dean at John Wesley College, High Point, North Carolina. He has served as a minister in Quaker (Friends) and United Methodist Churches for 35 years. He is a co-founder of Global Missions Group, an interdenominational non-profit based in North Carolina, with a mission "to build churches that otherwise would not be built." The first project is a church in the village of Santa Isabel, Brazil.

Wood was elected as Speaker Pro Tem of the North Carolina House in 1997–1999, the second Republican elected to that post during the 20th century. He became the first Republican Chairman of the House Education Committee in 1995, leading the legislature to establish landmark Charter School legislation and cut the size of the State Department of Public Instruction bureaucracy nearly by half.

He was selected a member of the Oxford International Roundtable on Education convened at Oxford University in 1999. In 1992, Governor Jim Martin presented Wood the Order of the Longleaf Pine, the highest civilian award given by the state of North Carolina.

Wood is a US Army veteran, (1970–1971), served as a Veterans Service Officer for the State of North Carolina Division of Veterans Affairs, (1987–1989), as Vice-Chairman of the Guilford County Republican Party, (1980–1984), and on the North Carolina Republican Party Executive Committee.

President George W. Bush appointed Wood to serve on the Selective Service Commission in 2001, where he still serves.

Earned degrees include a BA in History/Religion, Asbury University (Wilmore, Kentucky); Th.B in Bible/Theology, Laurel University (High Point, NC); MA in History, the University of North Carolina at Greensboro; M.Div., Houston Graduate School of Theology (Houston, Texas); and D.Min from Luther Rice University (Atlanta, Georgia). He is a member of the academic Phi Alpha Theta International Historical Fraternity.

Wood is a singer, songwriter, recording artist, public speaker and performer. His songs include, "I'm On My Way to Heaven," recorded by the Grammy-nominated Dixie Melody Boys gospel music group. Recording credits include "Love and Devotion", with the Barney Pierce Family; "Travelin Troubadour"; "Titusoverture" (QCA Records). His song, "Sunday Brought the Cure," won the East Coast Songwriters Contest in the Christian music category (June 2012), and is the title song on his 4th album, (2013). He is the Executive Producer of the CD, "Songs for Santa Isabel" (2015,Tobytowne Records), a compilation album of 22 songs in support of the effort to build a new church in the village of Santa Isabel, Brazil, on the Amazon River in August 2015.

Acting/theater/performing experience includes an 'extra' in the George Clooney movie, Leatherheads (May 2007); the role of Burl Sanders in the gospel music comedy, Smoke on the Mountain, produced by the Little Theatre of Winston-Salem, North Carolina, (September 2007); an 'extra' in stock car racing film, Red Dirt Rising (November 2007); role of Ralph Levering in This Tender Place, Cherry Orchard Theater, Cana, VA, (August 2008); "Tom Dooley," Wilkes Playmakers (2009); "Moonshine and Thunder: The Junior Johnson Story," Wilkes Playmakers, (2009); extra in "The Fifth Quarter, (2010); "Dearly Beloved", (Wiley), 2013, Twin City Stage, WS, NC.

Research and writing include book reviews and articles in "Quaker Life", "Piedmont Christian News," Voice of Evangelical Methodism, Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, and biographical entries in the Dictionary of North Carolina Biography.

References

  1. ↑ "Committee Approves March Primaries". Star-News. 23 May 1995. p. 3B. Retrieved 31 March 2011.

"Wood Prepares For Takeover", High Point Enterprise,, January 26, l995, 2A. "Legislator Likes Rocking the Boat", News&Record, Greensboro,NC, May 30, 1995, 1A. "Group Backing Private School Vouchers Blasts NC Governors", Winston Salem Journal, June 22, 1995, B7. "Amendment Lets Judges Take Positions", "Under the Dome", The News and Observer, Tuesday, July 18, 1995, 3A. "Delegation Elects Wood", High Point Enterprise", February 11, l995, A1. "Charter Schools and Vouchers Proposed", Greensboro News&Record, April 15, 1995, B2.

Archdale-Trinity News, June 11, 2015, p.8. Piedmont Christian News, July 2015.


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