Appointed by the Governor
July 1, 2013 to June 30, 2017
Appointed by the General Assembly
July 1, 2017 to June 30, 2021
Joyce Conseen Dugan is a member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in Cherokee,
North Carolina. She is a graduate of Western Carolina University, where she received
both her BS (1974) and MS (1981) in Education. She began her education career as a
teacher's assistant in the Cherokee Central School system and after obtaining her
degree was employed as a teacher, progressing on to become Director of Federal Programs,
and in 1990 became the Superintendent of the same school system, a post she held for
five years. In 1995, she ran for and won the office of Principal Chief of the Eastern
Band of Cherokee Indians, the first woman to hold that office and to date, the only
woman to hold this office. She held this office for a term of four years, after which
she was employed by the tribe's casino enterprise to develop a program for tribal
members to assume management of the business, and later became the casino's Director
of Public, Government and Community Relations. In 2009, she returned to the Cherokee
school system from which she retired in 2011.
In 1997, she received the Distinguished Alumni Award from Western Carolina University, and in the same year was placed on the Honor Roll of Peak Performers from the College of Education and Allied Professions at WCU. In 2006, she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate degree from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill for her efforts towards cultural preservation. She currently serves on the Cherokee Indian Hospital Governing Board, the Development Foundation Board of Directors, the North Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching, and the Board of Directors for Mainspring (formerly Land Trust for the Little Tennessee).