Supporting Biotech Students While Honoring Their Son

Glenn Collins loves agricultural biotechnology, as anyone who has ever heard him speak on the subject can attest. He loves teaching it to students, too, and his enthusiasm for it sneaks unashamedly into his conversation and classroom.

Collins and his wife,
Ruby, have combined his
love of teaching with their desire to see talented young biotech students succeed by creating the Keven Glenn Collins Endowed Scholarship Fund in Agricultural Biotechnology.

The scholarship bears the name of their son, who died in the early 1970s just shy of his fifth birthday. “Keven was special to us, and so are our Kentucky students who are striving for their education,” said Glenn Collins, a professor who has been with the Agronomy Department since 1966.

“This is yet another way of being a part of the education process,” he said about the new scholarship. “It’s rewarding to see our financial resources at work.”

Agricultural biotechnology is the use of biological systems and organisms for scientific and commercial applications. Biotech involves genetic engineering, antibody and vaccine production, fermentation technology, plant regeneration from single cells, and many more emerging scientific techniques.

Collins, whose name is synonymous with biotechnology in the College of Agriculture and who is internationally renowned in the field, was instrumental in creating the biotech program in 1988, when it was first offered under the individualized curriculum option in the College. Thirteen students enrolled that first semester in the degree program that now is 146 students strong.
Collins serves as the director of undergraduate studies for the degree; teaches ABT 101, a first-semester course that all ag biotech students take together; and advises all biotech students for their first three semesters at UK. Fifteen permanent academic advisors take the students through the remainder of their degree.

The first recipient of the Keven Glenn Collins Endowed Scholarship is April Winstead from Slaughters, Kentucky. Collins taught Winstead in ABT 101 and served as her academic advisor; she worked part-time in his laboratory.

“April is a super young woman; we enjoy seeing her happy and pleased to receive this scholarship,” Collins said. “She is a fine role model.” Winstead has been accepted to attend UK Medical School this fall.

According to Collins, he and his wife had established the scholarship in their estate plan and will some years ago, but decided to activate it now.

“We were talking one day a couple of years ago about things we had planned and wanted to do, and the scholarship came up in the conversation. I said to Ruby, ‘You know, it would be nice to be around to see and interact with the Keven Glenn Collins Scholarship recipients rather than to have it activated after we are no longer around.’ She immediately said, ‘I agree totally.
I had been thinking of the same thing.’”

Glenn and Ruby knew they’d made the right decision when they were seated with the Winstead family at the Ag Scholarship Banquet last fall. “It was pretty special to interact with the first Keven Glenn Collins Scholarship recipient and her parents,” Collins added. “There were very nice warm and fuzzy feelings for us and a lot of appreciation from April and her parents.”

The $3,000 scholarship is designed to attract and provide an excellent level of financial support to an outstanding high school senior who is a biotechnology degree major. It is offered to the same student for all four years of the B.S. degree, provided the recipient maintains a 3.0 grade point average or higher.

“The degree involves rigorous course work but with the assistance of high school science teachers and counselors (and word of mouth from graduates), the degree attracts a very high caliber of high school science- and math-oriented students,” he commented.

Several factors contribute to the strength of the
program. Collins credits ABT 101 with getting the students off on the right foot. “They get to know each other and form study groups and many friendships. We also get them subscribed to a biotechnology majors listserv that gives them the ability to communicate with each other and the faculty, and to receive information on seminars, special events, part-time jobs, internships, and career opportunities,” he said.

The faculty are also highly committed to the program and the students, Collins said. “Their offices are always open and they do all the teaching and advising for the degree. Many of the faculty hire biotech students as part-time research assistants and this gives the students excellent one-on-one interaction with a faculty member. This is very supportive during the degree and it often leads to a positive career-deciding experience.”

The Collins’ daughters have their own success stories. The elder, Leslie Marie, earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering at UK and went on to earn a master’s and Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. She is currently an assistant professor of electrical engineering and biomedical engineering at Duke University.
Their third child and second daughter, Ashli Nicole, received a bachelor’s degree in biology from the University of Louisville and an M.D. degree from the U of L School of Medicine.

She is in her second year of a residency in pediatrics there.
Both daughters are married, and Ashli and her husband have two young children.
Glenn and Ruby Collins are both UK Fellows and Scovell Society members. They have named their daughters and sons-in-law UK Fellows, and Keven a Fellow in memoriam. All are Scovell Society members as well.

Glenn and Ruby Collins are both UK
alumni, Glenn having earned his
bachelor’s and master’s degrees in agronomy, and Ruby a bachelor’s in business. They left Lexington in 1963 while Glenn completed his Ph.D. from North Carolina State University, returning in 1966, the year he joined UK’s agronomy faculty.

Ruby Collins retired in 1996 from a 16-year career as the executive secretary of the Kentucky Society of Radiologic Technologists. When not entertaining their grandchildren, she enjoys running, reading, boating and swimming. Glenn’s spare time is filled with running, woodworking, fishing, tennis, and boating.

While retirement is “not on his radar screen at the present time,” Collins is “confident that the outstanding faculty which comprise the biotechnology degree will provide all the continuity and leadership needed to keep the degree going strong when I do decide to join the ‘emeritus’ ranks.

“The agricultural biotechnology degree is one of the most rewarding things that I have been involved with in my career,” he concluded.