ARKANSAS
Lisa McCullough ’88
Chief Financial and Operating Officer, Endeavor Foundation

Every day, Lisa McCullough (M.S. ’88) challenges her – and others’ – pre-conceived notions about poverty and the people who struggle with it.

“Poverty is a condition, not a personality trait,” McCullough says. “As one of my colleagues, Dr. Donna Beegle, likes to say, ‘Fight poverty, not the people who live in it.’”

McCullough is the chief financial and operating officer for Endeavor Foundation, a group that provides grant money for organizations in Northwest Arkansas. Over the past 18 years, Endeavor has provided more than $113 million to organizations improving people’s quality of life.

McCullough says there is a lot of need to be met in her community.

“Living in the northwest corner of Arkansas, home of Wal-Mart, J.B. Hunt, Tyson, the University of Arkansas, as well as all of the organizations supporting them, there is a tremendous amount of wealth. However, our community also has one of the highest rates of child poverty in the nation.”

McCullough didn’t set out to create a career in nonprofit work. After graduating from UMKC with her master’s degree, she moved to Arkansas to get married. She then worked for several for-profit companies before choosing to stay home with her children for several years.

“During that time, I spent a significant amount of time volunteering in the local schools. It was there that I was touched by the needs in our community.”

McCullough believes everyone can learn something about poverty and the people who live in it. Again, she quotes her colleague Donna Beegle.

“If you are judging, you cannot connect. If you cannot connect, you cannot communicate. If you cannot communicate, you cannot break poverty barriers. We all need poverty education – those living in it as well as those of us who aren’t.”