UALR history major Jeffery Stewart has won the 2014 F. Hampton Roy Award for best article manuscript on Pulaski County history.

Stewart received his award, which includes a $300 prize and certificate, at a meeting of the Pulaski County Historical Association on Feb. 9 at the Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site.

The program featured Kaye Lundgren, a public history graduate student at UALR, who delivered a presentation titled “Jeanette Rockefeller: From Rebellious Debutante to Art Patron.”

Stewart’s article, “Central Arkansas Christian School: A Study of the Relationship between Public School Desegregation and Private Schools,” will be published later this year in the Pulaski County Historical Review.

Stewart completed a seminar on the Little Rock school crisis last semester, taught by UALR George W. Donaghey Professor and Chair of History Department John Kirk. Stewart’s award-winning manuscript stems from a class research paper for Kirk.

The piece examines a private religious school founded in the early 1970s and argues that not all such institutions deserve the blanket title “segregation academy.” Stewart posits that there were differences in the way desegregation was approached.

“It’s a great study that provides another important piece in our understanding of school desegregation in Pulaski County,” Kirk said.

“And it demonstrates that not only faculty research but also undergraduate and graduate research can play a vital role in advancing knowledge in the area.”