Beverly Sparks, former head of UGA Cooperative Extension, and alumni of the UGA College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences has received the CAES Alumni Association’s Alumni Award of Excellence. 
“From the farm field, to the board and exam rooms, our alumni are leaders in a variety of areas,” said Elliott Marsh, president of the CAES Alumni Association. “These awards not only allow us to recognize the accomplishments of our fellow alumni, but also the ways in which CAES has contributed to our collective success.” 

The CAES Alumni Award of Excellence recognizes CAES alumni who have achieved excellence in their chosen field or in their community. Sparks accepted her award at the CAES Alumni Awards Banquet on Nov. 11 in Athens, Georgia. 

Sparks, who graduated from UGA with her undergraduate degree in horticulture in 1978, went on to receive her master’s degree in entomology from UGA and her Ph.D. in entomology from Louisiana State University. 

After a long career in UGA Cooperative Extension, Sparks was named associate dean for Extension in CAES, in 2007. She was the first woman to lead UGA Extension, and she served until 2014. Her leadership is credited with helping UGA Extension weather the financial turmoil that accompanied the great recession. 

This year, the CAES Award of Excellence was also presented to D. Wayne Akins Jr., chief retail banking officer of Synovus Bank; Charles Hubert Bronson Jr., former Florida Commissioner of Agriculture and Consumer Services and R. Lowry Weyman Hunt, Jr., a sixth-generation Morgan County farmer. 

Luke Lanier, assistant vice president of Metter Bank; Allison Perkins, UGA Cooperative Extension county agent for Bartow County; and Cliff Riner, coordinator of the Vidalia Onion and Vegetable Research Center, received CAES Young Alumni Achievement awards. 

UGA soybean pioneer John Woodruff, of Tifton, Georgia, and former Rep. Richard Royal, of Camilla, Georgia, were inducted into the Georgia Agricultural Hall of Fame.