Terry Hightower Turcotte

Terry Turcotte and Leigh-Anne Boland

Terry and Chloe

Most of you know that I moved to Clinton before our sophomore year. I went to Whitten Junior High. My family moved quite a bit while I was growing up. I have lived in Tennessee, Florida, North Carolina, and finally in Mississippi (Tupelo, Terry and Jackson before Clinton).

At Whitten, Mrs. Howell, (who lived in Clinton) and later Mrs. Strong had a major influence on me. After graduation, I attended Mississippi College for two years and then transferred to the University of Southern Mississippi where I majored in home economics. I graduated early in 1970 and worked briefly in Jackson before John and I married. We moved to Leakesville in southeastern Mississippi where I was a home economics teacher. We lived in a very old house that had been converted into a duplex. As the home economics teacher, I was expected to plan school board dinners and major school events.

When Hinds Community College hired John in 1971, we moved back to Jackson. I taught at Tri-County Academy at Flora, Edwards Attendance Center, and St. Joseph High in Jackson. I stayed at home after our second child, Erin Sydney, was born in 1982 but went back to work in 1985 when I got an opportunity to work part time as an adolescent education coordinator for a hospital in Jackson. Then, I went to work full time for the Jackson Clarion-Ledger newspaper as Newspapers in Education Coordinator. I was responsible for statewide marketing in schools and colleges, corporate sponsorships, and teacher workshops. My duties expanded later into public affairs and corporate event planning. In 2005, I began working as Statistician and Public Affairs Representative for the Clerk of the Florida House of Representatives.