Newsmakers

The Pregnancy Care Center in Springfield received a $21,000 grant from the Children’s Trust Fund for the center’s Fatherhood 3.6.5 program, which provides expectant dads with one-on-one mentoring.

The Good Samaritan Boys Ranch received a $3,125 grant from the Darr Family Foundation to support the construction of an outdoor classroom. The classroom will be used to teach the importance of the environment and natural resources to the school’s 76 residents.

Ozarks Food Harvest received a $7,000 grant from MAZON: A Jewish Response to Hunger. The food bank will use the money to help offset food distribution expenses.

Sertoma Club of Springfield appointed new officers: Don Angell, president; Chris Shelton, president-elect; Jeff White, secretary; Mel Saunders, treasurer; and Andrew Fitzpatrick, sergeant-at-arms. New members of the club’s Board of Directors are Cody Smith, Reed Hopper, Dan Reiter, Jared Doty, Brian Thompson and Josh Wilson. Ken Childers will serve as chairman.

The Springfield Convention & Visitors Bureau Board of Directors elected officers for 2009: Sally Hargis, chairwoman; Matt Gifford, vice chairman; Paula Frazier, treasurer; and Brad Gebhard, assistant treasurer.

Court Appointed Special Advocates of Southwest Missouri named Beverly Roberts the organization’s first developmental director. Roberts has psychology and journalism degrees from the University of Missouri.

Education

Drury University’s Breech School of Business Administration was awarded reaffirmation of accreditation by the Association of Collegiate Business Schools and Programs Baccalaureate/Graduate Degree Board of Commissioners.

Scott Sigman, associate professor of mathematics and computer science at Drury University, was elected regional representative for the Central Plains Region of the Consortium for Computing Sciences in Colleges. Sigman has been a member of the CCSC since the late 1980s.

Dennis Hickey, professor of political science at Missouri State University, received the James F. Morris Endowed Professorship. Hickey was a recent Fulbright exchange scholar at the China Foreign Affairs University in Beijing.

Health Care

Kirsten Pollick of Lebanon received the Muscular Dystrophy Association’s 2008 Robert Ross Personal Achievement Award for Missouri. Pollick completed her doctorate in professional clinical psychology with an emphasis in neuropsychology at the Alliant International University – California School of Professional Psychology in Fresno, Calif. She works as a U.S. Army contractor, assisting soldiers before and after tours of duty in Iraq.

Citizens Memorial Healthcare hired family practitioner Dr. Malcolm Oliver to work at the Dade County Family Medical Clinic. Oliver attended medical school at Indiana University School of Medicine and completed his family practice residency at St. Joseph Medical Center in South Bend, Ind.

Insurance

Four local Farmers Insurance representatives were inducted into the Farmers’ “Topper Club” of top sales producers. John Bishop, Ken Teague and Mark Pickens of Springfield and Joyce Taylor of Willard received the honor.

Real Estate

The Greater Springfield Board of Realtors awarded the 2007 Salesperson and Broker of the Year at the group’s Annual Award of Excellence Banquet on May 29. Daniel Clark of RE/MAX House of Brokers was the Broker of the Year, and Scott Rose of Murney Associates was the Salesperson of the Year.