The ASMSA Foundation Fund celebrated a strong year of fundraising and community support at the annual Director’s Circle Luncheon on Dec. 17.
The luncheon, held in the school’s new Creativity and Innovation Complex, served to thank groups who had provided capital support for the project as well as donors who have made gifts to a variety of student and faculty initiatives during the past year. More than $700,000 in gifts were made toward the $4.7 million classroom and multi-purpose building.
Capt. Al Carney (Ret.), chair of the ASMSA Foundation Fund Board of Ambassadors, thanked the 70 guests in attendance for their support of the school.
“The Foundation Fund and the Office of Institutional Advancement seek to raise broad-based support for ASMSA while helping alumni and friends of the school achieve their philanthropic goals,” Carney said. “You have all chosen to be a part of this group because of our mutual passion for generating a very high level of educational achievement among students across the state of Arkansas and, more recently, international students from other nations.”
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Sara Brown, director of institutional advancement for the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts, praised the foundation’s Board of Ambassadors and other donors for their forward-thinking approaches and investment in young people’s potential.
“Together, we are shaping the future and preparing the leaders of tomorrow by investing in the educational experiences cultivated at ASMSA,” Brown said. “We are helping students gain the knowledge and skills necessary to take their abilities to the next level, and your commitment and support has enabled us to continue to expand these opportunities for even greater success.”
Mary Zunick, executive director of the Hot Springs Sister City Program, was recognized as the recipient of the 2019 Advocate of the Year Award. Through her advocacy for global engagement, the school has received nearly $200,000 in grants and programmatic opportunities for students.
Zunick was one of the first community members to meet with ASMSA Director Corey Alderdice when he started in 2012. During the interview process, Alderdice spoke of interest in creating a global learning program at ASMSA that would help students and faculty study abroad. The two discussed the Sister City relationship between Hot Springs and Hanamaki, Japan, as a natural springboard of the initiative.
That visit led to ASMSA’s selection to participate in the Kakehashi Project in June 2013 by the Laurasian Institution. The program included an all-expenses paid trip to Japan for 25 students and staff. Students visited Hanamaki during the trip, which led the creation of a sister school relationship between ASMSA and Hanamaki Kita High School in 2016.
In 2015, ASMSA received a two-year, $60,000 grant from the Japan Foundation of Los Angeles to begin offering Japanese language courses. ASMSA is the only high school in the state to offer local classes in Japanese. This year, nearly one-quarter of ASMSA students are enrolled in a Japanese language or literature class.
Zunick’s leadership and network of connections with organizations committed to Japanese partnerships created opportunities for ASMSA to engage and build on existing relationships to create new and dynamic opportunities for students.
“Mary Zunick is our community’s leading advocate for the power that cultural exchange creates between communities across the globe,” Alderdice noted in remarks. “Her friendship, commitment and advocacy has helped ASMSA create a signature program in the humanities that defines the school’s leadership in cultural awareness, global engagement and the power of friendship between countries.”
Zunick, who was appointed an honorary consul of Japan by the Japanese government in 2018, spoke of the importance that cultural exchanges have for both students and communities.
“There are differences between the people who live across the street from you as well as on the other side of the world, but we have so much more in common than we have different. Hopefully these opportunities will not only provide precious memories but change how they see the world and see each other as a result of the trip [to Japan].”