Cary Owen (foreground) with Chancellor Anne Ponder and Professor Joseph Sulock

UNC Asheville Economics Professor Joseph M. Sulock has been named the University's first Cary Caperton Owen Distinguished Professor in Economics. The distinguished professorship was established in October 2007 in honor of Cary Owen, who is known throughout the state as a remarkable champion for public education. It is especially fitting that the distinguished professorship is in the field of economics; Owen was one of the first women to major in economics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Owen began her career as an advocate for public education as a member of the Buncombe County Board of Education. She went on to become the first woman elected to the Buncombe County Commissioners, and later served on the UNC Asheville Board of Trustees, the State Board of Education and the University of North Carolina Board of Governors.

The Cary Caperton Owen Distinguished Professorship in Economics is a three-year appointment that augments existing funding to allow a professor to pursue a special area of teaching, expand research efforts, and enhance professional development activities. This professorship has a $500,000 endowment; earnings from the endowment will provide annual funding for the professorship.

The professorship is the first of five new endowed distinguished professorships that will be established at UNC Asheville. The endowed professorships are made possible through recent initiatives of the C.D. Spangler Foundation, which will provide $26.9 million to support the creation of up to 96 distinguished professorships in the UNC system.

"Good professors are professors who like teaching students and like doing research. This effort on the part of my family is intended to retain, reward and recruit good professors," said C.D. Spangler, a successful Charlotte businessman who served as the president of the University of North Carolina system from 1986 to 1997.

As the Owen Distinguished Professor in Economics, Sulock will focus his work on the development of courses and research in the area of American poverty.

"I am pleased and proud to be the first Owen Distinguished Professor in Economics, and I am especially pleased to be able to expand the University's work in poverty courses, research and service learning," Sulock said. "We will be able to design and offer more courses dealing with this critical local, state and national issue; provide our students additional opportunities for undergraduate research; and work toward expanding the University's outreach to community organizations that assist low-income clients."

Sulock, who joined the University in 1975, is well-known for both his teaching and outreach to the community. He received UNC Asheville's Distinguished Teaching Award in the Social Sciences in 1995 and was named the 2003-04 Ruth and Leon Feldman Professor in recognition of his outstanding scholarship and service. He is the founder of the successful Crystal Ball economic forecasting seminar, which is widely attended by the regional business community and now in its 24th year.