Ouachita Stories

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Ouachita's Elrod Center awards $6,900 for servant leadership projects

April 10, 2026

The Ben M. Elrod Center for Family & Community recently announced it has awarded a total of $6,900 through its 2025-2026 Elrod Service Enrichment Grants. This year’s recipients included representatives from the university’s Department of Kinesiology, Department of Nursing, cybersecurity program, Department of History and Hickingbotham School of Business.

news

Collins, Dodge, Goss and Williams named Stepping Up for Ouachita honorees

April 7, 2026

Ouachita Baptist University will host its 16th annual Stepping Up for Ouachita luncheon, presented by Citizens Bank, on Friday, Nov. 6, at Chenal Country Club in Little Rock. The event will raise money for scholarships and honor four women: Julie (Hendrix) Dodge of Conway, Arkansas; Susan (Shambarger) Goss of Bentonville, Arkansas; Cheryl (Bass) Williams of Geyer Springs, Arkansas; and Dr. Kathy (Chapman) Collins of Arkadelphia, Arkansas (posthumous).

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Ouachita hosts Special Olympics Arkansas Spring Games

April 2, 2026

Ouachita Baptist University welcomed athletes from across Clark, Garland, Hot Spring and Saline counties to Hickingbotham Family Track & Field on April 1 for the 2026 Special Olympics Arkansas Area 10 Spring Games.

Ouachita Department of Theatre Arts presents "Into the Woods"

March 31, 2026

Ouachita students earn multiple awards at Midwest Model U.N. for ninth straight year

March 27, 2026

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The Signal Student Newspaper

OUACHITA CIRCLE: FALL // WINTER 2025

The alumni magazine of Ouachita Baptist University

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Ouachita has faced high times and low times. Years of strength and years of struggle. Through all these seasons — institutional and individual — one certainty remains: God's faithfulness.

The Why Behind Our Traditions

While we often want to hold on to the comfort of traditions, I think it’s important to ask why they were important to us. What about the behavior do we long to preserve? I often remind students to think beyond the behavior of a tradition and consider the belief behind it. What is it about the tradition that is important? Often, the importance is found in the why.

Staff Profile: Sonny Jackson

One member of the Ouachita family was Sonny Jackson. Once a professional middleweight boxer in the Pacific Northwest, Sonny wasn't a Ouachita graduate. But he was very much part of the family as a member and later the head of Ouachita's grounds crew.

Staff Profile: Rosemary Chu

When I give the newly arrived freshmen a taste of Ouachita history before classes start each fall, I tell the inspirational story of Rosemary Chu. What Chu had was the investment she had made in Ouachita. And Ouachita invested in her.

Faculty Profile: Phil Rice

What an honor it is to share a few words about a man who impacted my life so profoundly. As a good Baptist, I thought I would arrange my thoughts around three alliterative points: paper, people and purpose.

Ken Sandifer (left) with two students conducting field research on poisened fish. Photo from the 1965 Ouachitonian yearbook.

Faculty Profile: Kenneth Sandifer

Tim Knight shares about his professor and colleague, Kenneth Sandifer, professor emeritus of biology at Ouachita.

Faculty Profile: Bill Downs

Melinda Mayo reflects on her professor, Bill Downs, professor emeritus of mass communications, who served Ouachita for 41 years.

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