Westerman to address SACC grads

U.S. Rep. Bruce Westerman
U.S. Rep. Bruce Westerman

News-Times Staff Report

EL DORADO – U.S. Rep. Bruce Westerman of Hot Springs will be the guest speaker during the South Arkansas Community College Spring Commencement exercises, to be held at 7 p.m. on May 13 in the El Dorado Conference Center.

An engineer and forester, Westerman was elected the 20th representative of the Fourth Congressional District of Arkansas in 2014. He is a member of the Committee of Natural Resources, the Committee on the Budget and the Committee on Science, Space and Technology. He is the vice chair of the Environmental Subcommittee and a member of the Majority Whip Team.

Westerman was a state representative in 2011-2014, including stints as House minority leader in 2012-2013 and majority leader in 2013-2014. He was Arkansas’ first Republican majority leader since Reconstruction. Prior to that he was a member of the Fountain Lake School Board in 2006-2010, including board president in his last year.

He is a 2001 graduate of Yale University with a master’s degree in forestry and a 1990 graduate of the University of Arkansas with a bachelor’s degree in biological and agricultural engineering. While at Arkansas, he was a four-year walk-on for the Razorback football team.

In 2013 he was named Engineer of the Year by the Arkansas Society of Professional Engineers. He received the University of Arkansas’ Outstanding Young Alumni Award in 2005 and the Distinguished Alumni Award in 2012. He is a deacon at Walnut Valley Baptist Church. He and his wife, Sharon, have four children.

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