Serita Acker, executive director of Clemson’s PEER (Programs for Educational Enrichment and Retention) programs, knows how to set an example. She is the picture of professionalism: always composed, dressed to the nines and widely respected — from University leaders to the first-year students she teaches. Her tenure at Clemson, first as a student and then as an employee, stretches back more than 35 years.
Watching her work and observing her polished presence in any situation belies her start as a first-generation college graduate. Her mother and father, Samuel and Lola, both finished high school but did not go on, and just one generational step back, her grandfather could not read or write.
She has, for nearly four decades, dedicated her life to higher education and to introducing its power to those who might be unaware of it, particularly young people from underserved communities across South Carolina.
Acker’s grandparents picked cotton, and to avoid that life, her father joined the Army. Her mother attended a finishing school, which historically emphasized social graces and de-emphasized scholarship. Both of her brothers went into the military as well — one in the Air Force and one in the Army.
Acker decided to go a different route and earned a Bachelor of Business Administration from Lander University in 1989 and a master’s in human resources training and development from Clemson in 1999.
“I come from very humble beginnings,” Acker says. “And I knew from an early age that education was the way out. It’s a blessing I get to show that path to middle and high school students and current Clemson students today.”
Two of the most important people she guided down that path were her daughters, Brittany and Courtney.
“I preached the importance of education to my girls since they were babies,” says Acker, whose husband, Ronald, is a Vice President and Business Banking Officer at HomeTrust Bank. “Knowledge is something that no one can take away from you. It helped me get out of poverty. And thinking back about my granddaddy’s generation, they didn’t have the opportunities that we have now to sit behind a desk. They were picking cotton.”
Acker says she did everything she could to set her daughters up for success, including enrolling them in oratorical contests and encouraging them to participate in school leadership programs, such as student government.
“I had them doing everything so they could carry the torch of success farther than me, but I never imagined how far they would exceed my expectations,” Acker says.
Both daughters are now Clemson graduates alongside their mother. Brittany, the oldest, earned a degree in psychology with a minor in human resources in 2015, and Courtney earned a Bachelor of Science in accounting in 2019 and a Master of Business Administration in 2025. Brittany serves as an EPA coordinator at Acentra Health, a technology and health solutions company, and Courtney is a vice president, treasury management officer at J.P. Morgan.
Courtney says reflecting on the juxtaposition of her grandparents’ lives with her own keeps her grounded.
“They weren’t granted the opportunity to further their education, but I believe I am a reflection of them,” she says. “I am a continuation of their hard work, their grit, and their perseverance. I think they’re looking down on my sister and me very proudly. And I want our children to take it even further than us.”
Acker fondly recalls a time when she was leaving on a business trip, and Courtney was six or seven years old. Little Courtney was sitting in the back seat of the car as her mom got into the front seat, dressed in a crisp business suit and carrying a briefcase. The little girl could not take her eyes off her mother.
“Look at you! Miss Soooo Important!” Courtney sang.
“Evidently, that was something that she homed in on,” laughs Acker. “She wanted to be someone who was just killing the game in business. And today I look at her, at 28, and she’s a mirror reflection of me then. She is Miss So Important now. It blows my mind.”
Acker sums up her blueprint for parenting with a line from the 2007 Denzel Washington movie The Great Debaters:
“Do what you have to do now, so you can do what you want to do later.”
“That’s exactly what I tried to instill in my daughters,” Acker says, “because getting an education is not easy. It takes work, but the rewards are great. It changed my life, it changed my husband’s life, and now it is changing my daughters’ lives too.”
Senior Writer Ken Scar partnered with Clemson University’s Video Services team to capture a candid conversation between mother and daughter Serita and Courtney Acker reflecting on their respective college journeys. With a shared experience that encompasses gratitude, grit and generational change, together the Ackers explore the reasons their family remains committed to the enduring belief that education creates opportunity. Their discussion, personal and poignant, reveals the important ways a Clemson education shapes life for South Carolina families, expanding what’s possible for future generations.
