Howard and Keri Walker planned for their firstborn to arrive on schedule in July. When Owen Lee Walker arrived on May 19,  everyone scrambled. Three weeks later, a healthy Owen came home.

But during those first few days after the baby’s surprise arrival, the nervous parents remember a blur of fear, fatigue, and anxiety.

“But through it all, nurses were there taking tremendous care of Owen, Kari, and even me,” said Howard, a major gifts officer at UALR’s Department of Development. “And I found out that the vast majority of them were graduates of UALR’s Department of Nursing.”

One reason is UALR’s partnership with St. Vincent and the Willard and Pat Walker Charitable Foundation. The foundation’s $1 million endowment to perpetuate the Walker Nursing Scholarship Program provides five full-time nursing scholarships per school year and two LPN or paramedic licensing scholarships a year.

But it doesn’t take $1 million to support UALR programs. Howard and Keri helped Baby Owen send a contribution of his own to UALR’s fundraising campaign, It’s Time for UALR, to support the nursing program that the family knows is turning out top-flight graduates for Central Arkansas.

It was Owen’s first – of what his parents hope will be many – philanthropic gestures in life.

To find out more about UALR’s campaign, visit the It’s Time for UALR site.