Paulina Webber Named Nancy McDonald Wood Scholarship Recipient

From left to right: Bryn Bagwell, Paulina Webber, and Nancy M. Wood.

Photo Provided by Nancy Wood

Paulina Webber, a member of Wesley Chapel UMC in Little Rock has been named the 2019-20 Nancy McDonald Wood Scholarship recipient. Mrs. Wood and her daughter, Bryn Bagwell, announced the award during the Palm Sunday church service. The daughter of Mrs. Jo Webber, Paulina will receive $5,000 toward her freshman enrollment at Dillard University in New Orleans, a Historically Black College and University.

Webber, a 2019 graduate of Parkview High School with a 3.9-grade point, has had strong leadership roles in several extracurricular activities including Beta Club, Dance Ambassador, and NHS. She began her community service as a young child when she and her mother often fed hungry homeless people under the bridge in Little Rock. In more recent years, Paulina was active in a weekly food pantry at her church and in The Great Giveaway which distributes school supplies and uniforms to children.

After experiencing Girls State last year and being elected to the Arkansas Supreme Court there, Paulina became even more interested in how the legal community could help poor disenfranchised people. She plans to enroll in Dillard in the fall with the goal of becoming a lawyer. In her application, Paulina recalled Galatians 6: “..as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone.”

The NMWood scholarship, established in 2015, is administered by the United Methodist Foundation of Arkansas and is open to a young woman who has been active in her home church and who carries her Christian values out into her community. The scholarship was established by friends and family of Nancy M. Wood to honor her interest in strong female lay leadership in the church. Harper Purifoy, the first Wood Scholar, graduated from Hendrix College in May 2019.

2019-20 applications for the scholarship will be available in the fall at arumc.org.