Inauguration of the Drs. Ann and Myron Rice Family Fund for the KITP

Event Date: 
December 9, 2008
Speaker: 
David Gross
Henry Yang
Monica Curry
Ann Rice
Kathryn Moler
Online Talks: 
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The Family Fund provides supplementary support to encourage and facilitate families -- especially those in which the physicist is also the mother of young children -- to participate in the weeks-and months-long collaborative research opportunities that are the hallmark of KITP programming. Ann Rice chose to donate the $1.4 million proceeds from the sale of her home, she and her husband Mike shared, to create the "Drs. Ann and Myron Rice Family Fund for the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics." Because the endowment was established in the form of a charitable remainder trust, Ann also generously added a cash gift of $30,000 that enabled the Family Fund to become operational in the spring of 2008. "I thought it would be a wonderfully appropriate memorial for Mike, who was so encouraging and supportive of my own career development," said Ann. "Both of us have had a life-long commitment to the value of higher education. With this gift we are enabling higher educators themselves to develop insight through collaboration. It pleases me that we have found a way to help that is deeply in keeping with our core values as a couple."

Speaker Bio: 
With a BA degree from the former Georgia State College for Women (GSCW), Ann Smith began teaching high school home economics when she was 19 years old. All the while teaching at the institutions she attended, she went on to complete a 1951 MS degree from the University of Georgia and a PhD from Florida State University in economics, sociology and personal finance. The latter degree was conferred in 1964, the year that she joined the UCSB home economics faculty as a teacher of family finance and investment. The author of two college textbooks on family management and more than 50 articles and one book chapter related to teaching financial management, Rice also served on the board of the Consumers Union. Honored for her service on the advisory board of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, she was named Alumna of the Year by Georgia College and State University (formerly GSCW). Ann's husband Myron Rice, known as "Mike", was an Ohio native, attended Miami University, where he obtained bachelor and master degrees in business, and Cleveland College, where he earned a doctor of chiropractics. After enlisting in the U.S. Army Air Force in 1941 and serving in Europe during World War II, Mike met and married Ann. They were married for 52 years. A skilled metal smith, Mike designed orthopedic footwear for children. In addition to his chiropractic practice, he owned and operated a trucking company. Awarded a Utah State University doctorate in business education in 1972, he served as professor at Santa Barbara City College for 20 years, where in addition to teaching he chaired the business department and supervised the work experience programs. He also helped to establish the graduate program at Brooks Institute, where he taught fledgling professional photographers how to make a business of their art.