After earning a grant from the National Science Foundation, Denver Prince was attending Vanderbilt University in the summer of 1959 when he was contacted by A.E. Burdick, the academic dean at Arkansas State Teachers College, now the 51��¥, about teaching at the institution.

“I was taking 14 hours and didn’t have time to come to Conway for an interview. Dean Burdick met me at the airport in Nashville to interview me for the job at UCA,” Prince said. “He came back and reported to Dr. Snow that he felt they should hire me.”

Prince was scheduled to return to Magnet Cove that fall and continue his role as a science teacher. Instead, he joined the UCA faculty.

“I started in the fall of 1959 teaching at UCA — teaching chemistry and physics,” Prince said.
Shortly into his faculty tenure, Prince applied for leave to go back to graduate school. He became the first chairman of the Department of Physics and Astronomy in 1965, the same year he earned a doctorate from Oklahoma State University. He remained in that position until he retired in 1994.

Prince had a storied career at UCA from his musical feats to student-centered educational approach.

He said Jerry Manion, former chair of the chemistry department, was interested in learning how to play the banjo and three other science faculty could play instruments.

“I couldn’t play anything, but we built a tub with a stick and a string as bass and formed a group called The Professors,” Prince said.

The Professors were a bluegrass-singing group made up of faculty members from the chemistry, physics and biology departments, which were all located in Lewis Science Center at that time.

The individual members were Ralva Bass on guitar, Neal Buffalo on fiddle, Manion on banjo, Prince on the washtub bass and Faril Simpson on mandolin and guitar.

The group was organized in the fall of 1967 and made their debut for the Kiwanis Club of Conway, as several members also belonged to the club. The Professors were a popular local attraction playing at campus, community and statewide events.

The other members of The Professors are now deceased, but Prince fondly remembers his time with them, from recording their album, traveling and performing at colleges and universities to their close friendship and playful times.

“We were playing once at the Miss Arkansas contest in Hot Springs, and I had the tub,” Prince said. “Manion had an expensive banjo, and everybody was interested in the tub instead of his banjo. He said, ‘You’ve got to get you a bass.’ So, I did.”

Prince has long since retired his bass, but not his commitment to UCA. He continues to support the university through endowments, the UCA Alumni Association and the Purple Circle, the official support organization for UCA Athletics.

This commitment to UCA and its students was recognized in 2003 when the “Old Gym,” constructed in 1936, was renamed the Prince Center in honor of Prince and his family. His wife, Freda ’62, ’66, and children, Melissa ’80, Mickey ’75 and Randy, all attended UCA.

In addition to his teaching and administrative duties, Prince volunteered for other roles at UCA, including cross-country track coach. Running had become a personal hobby for Prince, and working with the team allowed him to maintain the hobby, as well as impact students.

One such student was Michael J. White ’76. White was a business student taking a general science class in Lewis Science Center.

Prince said he remembers seeing White standing alone in a hallway wearing running shorts. He asked the student to join the team. White reluctantly agreed, but the decision changed his life.

In March, Prince received a two-page letter from White, which reads in part, “I cannot thank you enough when you reached out to me that fateful day in the science building. You gave me gifts I can never repay you. Those gifts, comradery/learning to push myself/set higher goals and expectations/to meet new challenges, had far-reaching affects that even decades later, I am still unwrapping. Yes, there were days of hard runs, but I look at them today with a huge sense of pride, all because of you. It gave me a higher level of self-confidence, which is an area in my life I totally lacked. Had it not been for you reaching out, my time at SCA/UCA would just have been time spent at college.”

Throughout his career and retirement, Prince has received many correspondences from former students. He said knowing the impact he’s had on their lives is what he treasures most.

“It’s the students,” he said. “It was always about the students.”

Karen Sullards ’72, ’75 has been a familiar face at alumni and special events at the 51��¥ for many years, particularly tailgates. More than that, other faces are familiar to her.

Sullards is known for being able to recognize individuals by name without looking at check-in lists or referring to others for assistance.

“That came from being a school principal,” Sullards said. “I made it a point when I was a principal to try to know everybody, to try to remember their names and be able to talk to them.”

Sullards spent more than 40 years as an Arkansas educator, primarily in the Pulaski County Special School District (PCSSD). She began her career in 1972 after completing her Bachelor of Science in Education. She also received a Master of Science in Education in 1975.

Her connection to UCA began much earlier. Sullards’ parents, the late Sybil ’53 and Fletcher Sullards ’55, were both UCA alumni. During her father’s attendance, the family lived on campus in Wingo Hall in a second-floor apartment.

She recalls fond memories of being on campus with her family. She attended the former Irby School on campus and often ate breakfast with her father in the bookstore, which was located in the basement of Old Main. When her father graduated, she also earned her first degree, the Baby of Arts, an honorary degree granted to children of graduating veterans and nontraditional students who had lived on campus.

Through the years, she has often come back to Wingo Hall for various alumni meetings. During one occasion, she found herself looking around the conference room. She told the group, “I think this was where we lived. Actually, it was this conference room that was part of our apartment.”

Her parents also worked in education, as her mother was a counselor and her father was a principal, but Sullards had planned to become an attorney. Her plan changed after her father suggested she work with preschool children to earn extra income for a summer while she was in college.

“So, I worked at Head Start and fell in love with those kids,” Sullards said.

During her career, she has had a number of roles in education: classroom teacher, instructional specialist, assistant principal and principal. She has worked as a school improvement director for the Arkansas Department of Education and as a capacity builder for the Arkansas Leadership Academy, a leadership development provider for teachers and administrators. Even though she has retired at least twice, she has also filled in as a substitute principal and worked as a coach with the leadership academy. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, requests for those short-term roles have decreased, she said.

Sullards won the 2008 Bobby G. Lester Excellence in Education Award for Administration and was recognized as Parent Teacher Association (PTA) Administrator of the Year in 2000 while working in the PCSSD.

Throughout her career, Sullards continued to maintain a close relationship with UCA and the alumni association.

She was elected to her first term on the alumni board in 1985. During this time, her father was serving as the president. In 2003, she was elected to the alumni board and served two consecutive terms. She was elected to the board a third time in 2011 and served as vice president. She has served on several committees, including events and scholarship, and has represented the association on the UCA Foundation Board. Due to her dedicated service, Sullards was recognized with the UCA Alumni Service Award in 2012.

With the current pandemic, Sullards’ pace has begun to slow down, but not her dedication to UCA. She returns to campus for events such as the Windgate Center for Fine and Performing Arts groundbreaking ceremony, as well as other activities.

“I don’t think of myself as a legend because I think of my daddy and mother more as legends,” Sullards said. “I think of myself more of a legacy because they kind of left me a legacy, and it was my job to let that legacy continue.”