Kenroy Wallace hired as Graham High’s new athletics director

Kenroy Wallace has been hired as Graham High School’s new athletics director and will start July 1, stepping into one of the most visible jobs in the Falcons’ school day. The 48-year-old is relocating from Philadelphia and will also teach physical education classes at Graham, giving him a role that reaches from the gym and practice field into the classroom.

Wallace replaces Kyle Ward, who is retiring June 30 after a long career at Graham. Ward has been a familiar figure in Graham athletics for years and is listed on the school’s staff roster as both health and physical education teacher and athletic director. His exit closes a long local run just as the school’s sports program enters a period of change tied to conference realignment and roster pressures.

The new athletics director arrives with coaching and administrative experience outside Alamance County. Wallace spent about a decade coaching track and field at St. Joseph’s Prep in Philadelphia, has worked as a middle school athletics director and also coached at Rutgers University-Camden, according to his coaching bio. The bio identifies him as a Level 1 USA Track & Field coach. Wallace has also been working remotely in health care since moving to Whitsett about a year ago, and he said the Graham job gives him a chance to return to school-based work after time away from education.

That background matters because Graham’s athletic director is not only organizing schedules and practices. The job has become tied to hard decisions about whether teams can field enough players, how coaches are supported and how the school communicates with families when seasons shift. In March, Ward said Graham and Cummings would not field baseball teams because there were not enough athletes willing to commit, a reminder that participation numbers can determine whether a team exists at all.

Wallace also takes over as Graham adjusts to a new conference landscape. Under North Carolina High School Athletic Association realignment, all seven Alamance-Burlington School System high schools were placed in the same Mid-Carolina Conference, along with Roxboro Person. The NCHSAA moved to an eight-classification system from four, and ABSS athletic officials said the change creates more local matchups for student-athletes, families and fans.

For Graham, that means the athletics director’s first stretch will be about more than introductions. Wallace will be managing a program in which scheduling, travel, participation and program stability all intersect, while trying to preserve the school’s place in a changing local sports map.