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points of pride Honored with the Committee’s Choice Award at the Arkansas State Festival of the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, the UAFS production of Anton Chekov’s Three Sisters. Several students also won individual awards for acting, honor crew, publicity design, and lighting design. “Chekhov is considered by many theatre professionals to be some of the hardest material in the business,” says UAFS Theatre Director Bob Stevenson.
DONA RINNE
The Excellence in Preservation through Restoration Award, accepted in January by DrennenScott site director Tom Wing (middle), recognizes an intensive six-year restoration effort by UAFS and its project partners.
“I CAN HONESTLY SAY say this was one of the most special events I have had the honor to attend,” says Tom Wing, director of the Drennen-Scott Historic Site, of the January ceremony at the Arkansas Governor’s Mansion where he accepted the Excellence in Preservation through Restoration Award from the Historic Preservation Alliance of Arkansas. The award recognized the university’s work on the Drennen-Scott House in Van Buren, which dates to the early 1830s. In May 2011, after an intensive six-year restoration effort, the university opened the historic house and grounds as not only a public museum but also a working lab for history and archeology students. In its first seven months of operation, it had already seen more than 5,000 visitors from across the country. The restoration was helped by more than $5 million in grants and by numerous stakeholders—the City of Van Buren, the Arkansas Department of Heritage, Historic Arkansas Museum, Arkansas Natural and Cultural Resource Council, Crawford Construction, the Arkansas Archeological Survey, the architectural firm of John Milner Associates Inc., and, perhaps most importantly, Caroline Bercher of Lavaca, Scott Bulloch of Van Buren, and Drennen Bulloch of Little Rock, fifth-generation descendants of original owner John Drennen. “The Drennen-Scott project provided UAFS with an incredible opportunity to save a local historical treasure while gaining a laboratory for UAFS students,” says Wing. MORE ONLINE: Learn more about the Drennen-Scott Historic Site or plan a visit at www.uafs.edu/humanities/drennen-scott-house.
Displayed at the Abecedarian Gallery in Denver as part of a juried exhibit, Alphabook: A Celebration of Letters, a book with a handcrafted cover designed by senior Graphic Design major Kristin Catlett. Catlett designed and bound the book in a course taught by Katie Harper. The Denver exhibit, titled “Hand Lettered,” featured artists from California to New York and Florida to Minnesota, as well as two international artists. Catlett was the only Arkansas artist represented.
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UAFS Honored for DrennenScott Restoration
Published by the University of Oklahoma Press, Parley Pratt and the Making of Mormonism, a 351-page book co-edited by UAFS Spanish professor Greg Armstrong and associate English professor Dennis Siler, who also co-wrote the book’s introduction. Pratt, who Armstrong calls “arguably the third most important individual in early Mormon history” after Brigham Young and Joseph Smith, was murdered near Van Buren in 1857 by the estranged, legal husband of one of his plural wives.
Awarded first place in the Video Promo category at the South Central Broadcasting Society Annual Regional Undergraduate Student Electronic Media Competition in Austin, UAFS Media Communication majors Aaron Hodges and Nick Kyrouac, for “UAFS Media Communication Promo,” a video made for a course taught by Dr. Susan Simkowski. Another student, Josiah Gorham, took second place in the Video PSA category for his public service video, “Islamophobia.” This academic year is the first for the Media Communication major at UAFS. Named Student of the Year for 2011 by the Arkansas Nursing Students’ Association, UAFS senior Jake Malone, for outstanding academic and clinical work as well as for his community activities and his efforts on behalf of the UAFS Student Nurses Association. The UAFS Student Nurses Association also won the Community Health Award from the state organization for the students’ work collecting suitcases, duffel bags, backpacks, and
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UAFS BELL TOWER
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