Bunny and Carol Adcock have established a $1 million endowment for study abroad opportunities at the University of Central Arkansas.
The Adcock Study Abroad Fund will provide financial support for students to live and study abroad. A check presentation and a plaque honoring the Adcock family was held in November 2016 in the Wingo Hall Board of Trustees Conference Room.
“By providing an endowment for our students to travel and study abroad, it will provide opportunities for generations of UCA students to travel the world, learn other cultures and languages, interact with others and really change UCA and Arkansas. What these students will learn and experience, and then bring back to UCA and our state, will pay enormous dividends for our state and institution down the road,” said former UCA President Tom Courtway. “We all express our most sincere thanks and appreciation to Bunny and Carol for their unwavering commitment to our students and the mission of this University.”
This marks the second endowment from the Adcocks for study abroad opportunities. The first was allocated for students majoring in a foreign language who also planned to become educators.
Carol noticed the need for additional study abroad opportunities for foreign language teachers while working as a foreign language instructor at UCA in the 1970s. During this time, she was also serving as an adviser for foreign language student teachers and recognized the need for more study abroad opportunities like the one she experienced as a college student living in France and Mexico.
“I was going to all the schools where they were student teaching, and I saw what a difference it made to go into a classroom where the teacher had never been abroad,” she said. “I thought it would be better to go abroad and actually know the culture.”
That endowment has supported more than 80 students with a total of nearly $45,000 since 2000. The couple said this recent endowment is much broader. It will allow full-time students of all majors and career paths to apply for the study abroad funds, with preference given to students majoring in a foreign language. The scholarships will fund up to 75 percent of program costs including travel, food, lodging and tuition and fees.
“That’s all a part of growing and expanding your horizons, and that’s what will happen to these students. They will grow and develop and be more educated because they left McGehee, Arkansas and saw there’s a lot more to this world than just McGehee,” Bunny said referring to his own hometown. “It’s just like studying history. It is part of an education.”
Kale Gober, vice president for University Advancement, said, “UCA’s success is credited to supporters like Bunny and Carol who give their support for the sole purpose to impact the lives of our students, and I have no doubt their generosity will make an immeasurable difference for countless students.”
The Adcocks have supported UCA for at least four decades. In addition to Carol Adcock’s time as a foreign language instructor, Bunny Adcock currently serves on the Board of Trustees. In 1974, he served on the University Status Committee for the University, which was then the State College of Arkansas. He is a founding member of UCA Purple Circle and Friends of the UCA Library. Bunny was also appointed interim vice president for Financial Services in 2008 and served until June 2009. Prior to that, he had served as vice president for Alumni Services and Development as well as head golf coach from 1998 to 2003.
Bear Tales – Adcock Study Abroad Fund Donation