Stone Ward founder Millie Ward to speak at Journalism Alumni Series March 15-16

March 3, 2010 -- Millie Ward, a Wynne native, will be the third speaker in the spring Journalism Alumni Series at Arkansas State University.  Ward, a 1975 graduate of ASU, is co-founder and president of Stone Ward advertising agency with offices in Little Rock and Chicago. She will address students and faculty Monday-Tuesday, March. 15-16, in ASU’s College of Communications and will meet with Chancellor Robert L. Potts.

Ward served as editor of The Herald and the yearbook and was also a campus leader during her time at ASU. In 1994, she was awarded the Distinguished Alumni Award from ASU.

Ward began her professional career after graduating from ASU by becoming a copy writer for a small agency in Jonesboro.  After that, she worked for the Arkansas Industrial Development Commission and in 1979, became a copywriter for Combs Resneck Stone in Little Rock.  She was promoted to partner with Resneck Stone and in 1985 the agency took on Ward’s name, then became Stone and Ward in 1991.

She served as the first female president of Advertising Marketing International Network, one of the nation's largest networks of independent agencies representing 26 agencies with $21 billion in capitalized billings and served as its spokesperson during her two-year term.  She has been named one of AdWeek’s “Women to Watch”, one of the “Top 100 Women” by Arkansas Business and Arkansas Woman Business Owner of the Year in 1993 by the National Association of Women Business Owners.

Her civic involvement includes chairman of the Little Metrocentre Commission, past president of the Downtown Partnership, and member of the board of directors of Fifty for the Future, Arkansas Women’s Foundation and Friends of the Old State House Museum.  She is accredited in Public Relations and has served as president of the Arkansas Public Relations Society of America.


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