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Contact: Sasha Steinberg

STARKVILLE, Miss.—Community leaders, architects, planners and others interested in learning more about community design are encouraged to attend Mississippi State’s Small Town Summit, an Oct. 7 event celebrating the 40th anniversary of the university’s Fred Carl Jr. Small Town Center.

Admission is free, but organizers are asking attendees to pre-register at .

Along with various presentations highlighting the center’s history and accomplishments, the 1-5 p.m. summit will include a 2:10 p.m. keynote address titled “From Blight to Bright: How Creative Placemaking Transforms Communities,” presented by Wendy Benscoter, executive director for Shreveport Common Inc.

Carl Small Town Center Director Leah Kemp said the event is about celebrating and sharing the center’s rich history as the first community design center focused on small town challenges.

“The center has made an enormous impact in communities across our state over the past four decades, and we want to share those stories with everyone by hosting an exhibit filled with amazing project artifacts, as well as by bringing key leaders back to discuss the center’s role over the years,” Kemp said. “It will be a great opportunity for School of Architecture alumni to reconnect with former faculty and administrators.”

Benscoter will share stories of how Shreveport Common and small towns across Louisiana have built action-oriented teams of public/private partners through a Creative Placemaking process. This evolving field of practice leverages the power of arts, culture and creativity in communities.

The summit also includes a 4:45 p.m. ribbon cutting and reception for the �㽶ֱ��School of Architecture’s Charlotte and Richard McNeel Gallery at Giles Hall. A “40 Years at the Carl Small Town Center” exhibition is on display Oct. 4-11 in the gallery.

A 1979 alumnus and current chair of the �㽶ֱ��School of Architecture’s Advisory Council, Richard McNeel is a 2019 recipient of the President’s Medal for Distinguished Service, the highest honor awarded by the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards. He brings 40 years of professional experience in planning, design and building to his work as president of the Jackson-based firm JBHM Architecture. Charlotte McNeel has �㽶ֱ��bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education, which she earned in 1975 and 1977, respectively. The couple’s gift created an endowment to support the new gallery.

A complete Small Town Summit agenda is available online at .

For more information, contact Leah Kemp, director of MSU’s Carl Small Town Center, at 662-325-8671 or LKemp@caad.msstate.edu.

Housed in MSU’s College of Architecture, Art and Design, the Carl Small Town Center is a statewide community design outreach program that was endowed in 2004 by major benefactor Fred E. Carl Jr. of Greenwood. Carl attended �㽶ֱ��as an architecture major and was a 2009 selection for an honorary Doctor of Science degree. As an advocate of meaningful design for small towns, the center provides planning and design services and conducts research to generate solutions for problems faced by communities across the nation.

Learn more at and on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram @smalltowncenter.

�㽶ֱ��is Mississippi’s leading university, available online at .