To get a sense of how Debbie and Michael Bell think, look at a testimonial Debbie wrote for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga Honors College web page. “I retired from UTC after more than 40 years; my husband, Michael, retired a few months later,” Debbie penned. “The last 23 years of my working life were in Honors. Beyond working with amazing students and dedicated colleagues, Michael and I were privileged to travel and to develop close personal relationships with many of the students. (In fact, we’ve attended 26 weddings, including 11 where honors students/alumni married each other!) We saw first-hand the impact that enriching opportunities and a community of shared experiences has on a student. “Our lives were enriched through our association with Honors and we want to see students continue to benefit from what the Honors College offers. This is why we choose to continue our support of its mission to help students grow personally and professionally.” 8
UNIVERSITY OF CHATTANOOGA FOUNDATION
The Bells provided a combined 85 years of service to the University (Debbie 44, Michael 41). Following their recent retirements from UTC—Debbie in June 2020 and Michael in April 2021—they decided to include the Honors College in their estate plan, creating a planned gift that named the UC Foundation as a 40% beneficiary of their estate. Those funds, when received, will be used to support the Gavin Townsend Memorial Travel Scholarship Endowment. “If you can afford to make opportunities available to students, whether that is through scholarships or travel or mentoring—whatever the case may be—it’s a really positive thing, and I’m glad that we can,” Debbie says. “We don’t have children, so Michael and I jokingly talk about the students as our adopted children. They have been very important in our lives.” “None of us got where we are on our own; we all had people who helped us along the way,” Michael adds, “so the opportunity to contribute to somebody else’s success is important to us. Being able to help students who might not have opportunities or resources is a way of paying back for the help we received from others.” Debbie arrived on campus first, receiving a bachelor’s degree in English and American language and literature in 1976 (and later a master’s in education in 1990) before being hired as an administrative assistant in the Department of Psychology. Michael joined the UTC Library staff in 1980, the first position in an academic setting offered to him out of graduate school. “I literally drove from Nashville to Chattanooga with whatever I
