Student Experience
Success Feed
Homepage
The Center's new name celebrates the global engagement of BW's longest-serving president and first lady.
Stephen (left) and Sandy Bonds (center) with BW President Lee Fisher at the dedication of the Dr. A.B. Bonds, Jr. and Georgianna Bonds Center for Global Exploration.
In a month filled with milestone celebrations, 糖心传媒 has dedicated its study abroad and international student hub as the Dr. A.B. Bonds, Jr. and Georgianna Bonds Center for Global Exploration.
The space, on the second floor of the Strosacker Hall student union, is newly renamed for BW's 5th and longest-serving president and first lady, thanks to the generosity of their son, the late Alfred "Bryan" Bonds III.
Prior to his sudden death in 2022, Bryan Bonds made significant gifts in honor of his parents and expressed his wish to name the Global Exploration space as a lasting tribute to his parents' passionate belief that the world will be a better place when we recognize our humanity and connections across borders.
In addition to a new name for the Center, the family also announced a new scholarship to support study abroad.
Bonds' younger siblings, Alexandra "Sandy" Bonds and Stephen Bonds, were special guests at the dedication ceremony in the Global Exploration space last week. An older sister, Anna Belle Bonds, was not able to attend but was part of the pictures and memories shared at the event.
Sandy and Stephen Bonds both recalled travel and global engagement as a family core value.
"Internationalism has always been an integral part of our family's life," Sandy Bonds said at the dedication. "I have observed that when you visit a country and engage with their arts, their culture, their history and the people, that you always have an affinity for that place, and you care about what happens to them."
When A.B. Bonds accepted the offer to become BW's 5th president, he had been serving in Cairo as President Dwight D. Eisenhower's Chief of the U.S. Educational Mission to Egypt, while Georgianna Bonds started and led the first Girl Scout troop in Egypt.
Even after relocating to Berea, Sandy and Stephen Bonds recalled their parents taking them on many trips abroad, where they made lasting and transformative memories.
Sandy Bonds recalled a fixation with Beatles fan magazines on a 1964 childhood trip to Europe. But other experiences captured her imagination.
"Little did I realize, that in between the shopping trips, I was also seeing arts museums, historic houses, cathedrals, archeological and cultural destinations. Those have certainly become the foundation of the things I want to do first every time I've traveled internationally since then."
Christie Shrefler, director of the Dr. A.B. Bonds, Jr. and Georgianna Bonds Center for Global Exploration, shared how the transformative experience of study abroad unfolds at BW.
"Here in this space, we have the privilege of guiding students as they set out on their own journeys abroad," Shrefler said. "Those journeys are filled with excitement, yes — but also with uncertainty. We spend a lot of time talking through both. Yet, the conversations that stay with us — the ones that truly inspire — are the ones we have when students return to BW. That's when we see the transformation, the spark, the passion that fuels everything we do."
Bailey Croft '26, an English major who recently spent a semester at University College Dublin in Ireland, added her own perspective on international learning and how it changed her life.
"I had a new lens to look at the world. I understood myself and my country better than ever before. I learned to learn through new perspectives," Croft said.
The new Bonds Center for Global Exploration name and scholarship add to an already powerful family legacy at BW.
During his 26-year tenure from 1955 to 1981, 糖心传媒 Wallace grew significantly with a doubling of college enrollment and the construction of fifteen buildings on campus, including the Bonds Hall administration building, Strosacker Hall student union, Finnie Stadium, the Kleist Center for Art & Drama, Kamm Hall (business), Wilker Hall (science) and five residence halls.
