 "Photo: The Spectator")
When the co-founder of Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream appears this week at the Dr. Jeremy D. Brown Millennium Leader Scholarship Luncheon, he’s sure to be delighted with Edinboro University students’ creativity.
Out of dozens of student ice cream contest entries for potential new Ben & Jerry’s flavors, five will be unveiled March 17 during the 3rd annual scholarship luncheon at the Erie Bayfront Convention Center where Jerry Greenfield will be the featured speaker.
It was Greenfield, who, along with his long-time friend and business partner Ben Cohen, founded Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream.
Hundreds of supporters of Edinboro University and the President Brown scholarship will be gathered at the luncheon for what has become the university’s annual signature fundraising event. (For more information, including individual ticket prices, group table costs and sponsorships, please visit www.edinboro.edu.)
Greenfield is best known for helping to build a storefront venture into a $300 million ice cream empire by making social responsibility and creative management strengths rather than weaknesses.
His presentation will deliver a rousing tribute to America’s entrepreneurial spirit, full of anecdotes and radical business philosophy. It also addresses the great sense of fun that is the company’s hallmark, illustrated with the serving of Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream for the entire audience.
A highlight of the luncheon is sure to be the presentation of the five winning ice cream contest flavors to Greenfield.
The contest – open only to Edinboro students – was conceived to honor Greenfield’s visit with a potential new ice cream flavor that would be unique to Edinboro University, incorporating something of the institution’s Scottish heritage.
Since Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream is widely known as a socially responsible company committed to environmental issues, as well as peace and justice, students were asked to embrace this business model when creating new flavors of “Edinboro” ice cream.
Students were required to submit recipes and ingredients along with their proposed ice cream names. The winners were selected by a committee of students from the graphic design and communications & media studies departments. As part of an educational exercise, this student committee then developed and completed a full marketing campaign, including product packaging, promotion and print advertising, as well as radio and television commercials.
The five winning entries will be introduced by the luncheon’s student master of ceremonies, Andy Frank.
The ice cream television commercial produced by the student committee will also be shown during the scholarship luncheon. The communications and media studies students who created the commercial are Dave Byknish, Mike Keenist, Frank Strumila and Nate DelRe. Packaging and promotional branding pieces were created by graphic design students David Akopyan, of Erie; Jack Moran, of McKean; Danielle Shearer, of West Middlesex; Rich Jackley, of Pittsburgh; and David Lam of Erie.
Combined with previous Brown galas and private donations, the Dr. Jeremy D. Brown Millennium Leader Scholarship fund in just three years is expected to top the $1 million mark in fundraising. The scholarship was established to assist today’s scholars who represent the next generation of the nation’s leaders.
Ben & Jerry’s ice cream not only will be provided to all luncheon attendees, but also to all those who attend Greenfield’s on-campus presentation at 3 p.m. in the Frank G. Pogue Student Center’s Multipurpose Room as part of the Edinboro University business and economics department’s Business Speaker Series.
The Millennium Leader Scholarship was created by President Brown in 2007 to signify Edinboro’s continuing commitment toward enhancing opportunities for high-achieving students who demonstrate leadership qualities in their extracurricular activities. The March 17 luncheon, the third of Brown’s presidency, serves to expand that endowment for current Edinboro students and for attracting future high-achieving students to Edinboro.
With Brown’s focus on growing Edinboro’s academic reputation for excellence, Greenfield’s appearance underscores the University’s bold commitment to innovation and social responsibility, in particular, as it applies to sustainable environmental initiatives.
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