PEN N STATE BEH RE N D
Black School of Business FALL/ W I NT E R 2 021/2022
6 Doing Business in Style Student manages growing video production company 4 Executives in Residence Engage Students 8 New Center for Family Business Launched 10 Professor Studies Contradictions in Sustainability 11 K-12 Outreach Website Aids Teachers
DIRECTOR’S MESSAGE Greetings! We hope you enjoy this latest issue of Business News. The fall semester has been busy— with the return of our professional development DR. GREG FILBECK activities and student clubs to in-person events, masked but no longer requiring social distancing. The enthusiasm was evident as the semester began with our outdoor kick-off event, which drew nearly 200 students and record sign-ups for the student organizations that were present. You can read more about that event in this Business News. Our two new outreach centers have taken off exponentially this fall. The Center for Family Business received exposure from five major media outlets in September and October. The center’s first big event featured a keynote address by executives of Spangler Candy Company and a panel of board members discussing critical topics in family businesses.
In Brief
BLACK FAMILY GIFT EXPANDS KNOWLEDGE PARK REACH
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$3 million gift from Erie businessman Samuel P. “Pat” Black III and his daughter, Sumi James-Black, will amplify the role of Penn State Behrend’s Knowledge Park as an engine for economic growth in northwestern Pennsylvania. A one-to-one University match will double the gift, generating a $6 million investment in Knowledge Park. The match was provided through Penn State’s Economic Development Matching Program, which leverages University funds for select initiatives that will drive job and business creation in Pennsylvania. At the announcement of the gift, on September 9, Knowledge Center, a shared facility utilized by the twenty-two tenant companies in the park, was
renamed the Samuel P. Black III and Sumi James-Black Knowledge Center. “The Black family’s quiet but consistent support of fledgling businesses and forward-thinking entrepreneurs is an investment in the future of Erie,” Chancellor Ralph Ford said. “We are fortunate that their vision aligns with the mission of Knowledge Park, the region’s premier research environment and a fundamental component of the college’s Open Lab model of innovation.” The Knowledge Park gift is the latest in the Black family’s support of Behrend. The Black School of Business is named in honor of Pat Black’s late father and mother, Sam and Irene, who endowed the school with a $20 million estate gift.
In the coming months, we will be hiring a director for the center, helped along by an anonymous $150,000 gift to support the launch. Memberships are now available for the center! Our Center for Financial Literacy, meanwhile, is off to a fast start with more than a dozen regional presentations and continued analytical work in conjunction with the CFA Society Pittsburgh. We thank our 175 professionals who serve on one or more of our advisory boards within the school. In the spring, our Strategic Planning Task Force will begin work on our new strategic plan, Strategy 2028. We will complete that in the fall of 2022 before our next AACSB Peer Review Team visit for reaccreditation in the spring of 2023.
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Samuel P. “Pat” Black III and his daughter, Sumi James-Black, pictured above, are both members of the Black School of Business’ Advisory Board. Pat Black served as chair of the board from 2007-2021, and is now chair emeritus.
ON THE COVER Liam O’Brien has his own style of doing business. The junior, who is dual majoring in International Business and Finance, took a gap year to get career experience in Brazil. He’s also the business manager for Oddity Productions, a filmmaking and advertising company that he and two friends started. On page 6, learn more about O’Brien, his work, and his hopes to promote filmmaking at Behrend and in the Erie community.
Faculty News NEW FACULTY Dr. Benyawarath Nithithanatchinnapat, assistant professor of management information systems. Dr. Muhammad Odeh, assistant teaching professor of project and supply chain management.
PROMOTIONS Dr. Ozgun Demirag has been promoted to professor of operations and supply chain management. Dr. Peerasit Patanakul has been promoted to professor of management. Carol Putman has been promoted to associate teaching professor of management.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS Dr. Ozgun Demirag, professor of operations and supply chain management, was awarded the Penn State Behrend Council of Fellows Excellence in Research Award.
Carol Putman, assistant teaching professor of management, is one of the faculty members teaching courses in the new Interdisciplinary Science and Business program.
INTERDISCIPLINARY SCIENCE AND BUSINESS MAJOR NOW OFFERED
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he Black School of Business, in collaboration with Penn State Behrend's School of Science, has a new major–a bachelor of science in Interdisciplinary Science and Business (ISB). Students pursuing the ISB degree will have a choice of three business modules—accounting and finance; technical sales; or operations and supply chain management—and three science modules—quantitative science, including courses in statistics, mathematics, visualization, and databases; laboratory science, covering biology and chemistry; and human health, emphasizing studies of the health care industry. Completion of the ISB degree will prepare students to work on the business side of science-based companies and organizations.
Dr. Matt Swinarski, associate professor of management information systems, is part of a team of researchers comprising faculty members from the Black School of Business and the School of Engineering that was awarded a three-year, $300,000 National Science Foundation (NSF) Education grant to develop a “system view” of manufacturing education.
FILBECK ELECTED TO A TOP CFA LEADERSHIP POST Dr. Greg Filbeck recently began a two-year term as a member of the Presidents Council Representatives for the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) Institute. He is one of just twelve elected members who are responsible for oversight of the world’s largest such professional organization that has more than 300,000 members from 160 countries. Filbeck oversees the CFA societies for the eastern United States, including New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C.
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In Brief
PROFESSIONALS EXPAND EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITIES
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STUDENT-MANAGED FUND SURPASSES $1 MILLION The Intrieri Family StudentManaged Fund, which began in 2012 with a $100,000 gift from alumnus Vincent Intrieri ’84 and his wife, Joanne, has grown to more than $1 million. At the end of September, the value stood at $1,128,000. Reaching the million-dollar milestone means funds gained beyond that mark will help fund student scholarships. “The original plan was to start offering scholarships in two years to allow us to build up a cushion,” said Dr. Timothy Krause, associate professor of finance and co-director of the fund with Phil Stuczynski, lecturer in business and finance. “However, the market has done so well that we are looking at offering some scholarships in 2022.” While the scholarships are a nice bonus, the underlying value of the student-managed fund is evident for upper-level Finance students who have the opportunity to actively manage it. Many business alumni say their experience with the fund has contributed directly to their career trajectory.
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ix business leaders with experience in management, finance, and product innovation are serving as Executives in Residence in the Black School of Business this academic year. They are: Steven D. Bugajski, chief information officer, U.S. Steel. Matthew MacBeth, chief innovation officer, The Brookfield Group. Eugene Natali, CEO and founder, Troutwood. Jeremy O’Mard, managing consultant, IBM Global Business Services. Ann Scott, community outreach manager, Erie Insurance Group. Jeff Stempka, senior associate marketing manager, Campbell Soup Company. Executives in Residence lead workshops, sponsor class projects, judge business competitions, and provide career advising to students. Each brings industry expertise to the classroom, student research, and student networking. “The program is a major asset for our students and faculty,” said Dr. Greg Filbeck, director of the Black School. “Students gain hands-on, portfolio-building opportunities and begin to develop their professional networks. The guidance, mentoring, and firsthand experience these executives provide is invaluable.” Events led by the Executives in Residence this fall included: Marketing-Palooza with Jeff Stempka, who spoke to marketing classes, held appointments with students, and organized a panel for students to learn from and network with industry professionals. A Day in the Life of a Cybersecurity Professional at IBM with Jeremy O’Mard and David Chapin, North American privacy lead at IBM, who gave students a glimpse into the day-to-day life of cybersecurity professionals, offered tips on applying for internships and jobs, and highlighted continuing education after college through certification programs. The C3W Mentoring Program, created by Ann Scott, which kicked off its third year with a mentor training session taught by staff members of the college’s Susan Hirt Hagen Center for Community Outreach, Research and Evaluation (CORE). The C3W Program is designed to engage and develop female students in the areas of connectedness, capability, and confidence.
STEVEN D. BUGAJSKI
MATTHEW MACBETH
EUGENE NATALI
JEREMY O'MARD
ANN SCOTT
JEFF STEMPKA
ERIE STUDY MEASURES ECONOMIC IMPACT OF NEW AMERICANS
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mmigrants and refugees who resettle in Erie County contribute approximately $253 million to the local economy every year, according to a recent study by the Economic Research Institute of Erie (ERIE), an outreach center of the Black School of Business. That impact tends to increase the longer immigrants live here: Once naturalized, new Americans have higher rates of home ownership and are more likely to own their own business than their native-born neighbors. They also are less likely to be unemployed than native-born residents, according to the report. “Over time, they assimilate and become contributors to the economy,” said Dr. Mark Owens, associate professor of economics. He co-authored the report, working with Dr. Jim Kurre, associate professor emeritus of economics and a former director of ERIE. They based DR. MARK OWENS their findings on data from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, which is used to apportion federal and state funding for hospitals, schools, and emergency DR. JIM KURRE services. The survey polls approximately 1 percent of the U.S. population every year. “We wanted this to be a fact-based read on how the foreign-born impact Erie,” Owens said, “so we tried to take in the whole picture from the data, which shows both the positives and the negatives.” The study used data from 2015 to 2019. During that time, approximately 4.4 percent of Erie County’s residents were identified as having been born abroad.
They emigrated from at least eighty-seven countries, with the largest group—44.7 percent—coming from Asia. That broke from the national pattern over the same period, when 51 percent of immigrants were from Latin America. The majority of Erie’s immigrants were of working age: 73 percent were between the ages of 18 and 64, according to the study. For native-born residents, the figure was 60.8 percent. That added approximately 5,600 people to the local workforce, according to the study. The largest portion of that population, at 45 percent, worked in manufacturing, education, or health care. Immigrants also were more likely to work in food prepartion: 10 percent were employed in that industry, compared with 7 percent of native-born residents. “There is evidence that the industries that are growing, and that are going to need the most workers over the next ten years, already are seeing more involvement from foreign-born workers,” Owens said. “Maybe they’re more willing to take a job that happens to be available.”
Foreign-born residents of Erie County are more likely to rely on government transfer-payment programs, at least initially. According to the report, 5.5 percent received cash public assistance, compared with 3.6 percent of their nativeborn neighbors. Even more received Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, formerly known as food stamps: 34.7 percent relied on those benefits, compared with 17.5 percent of native-born families. “Immigrants are often under a lot of pressure when they come into this country,” Kurre said. “They are often expected to find work very quickly, and most of them do. “Foreign-born citizens are often times people who have chosen to come here, and in some cases are literally running for their lives,” Kurre said. “It takes a lot of effort and perseverance to go through all the steps it takes to get here, and those who succeed often endure hardships and have to do a lot of problem-solving along the way."
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Doing Business N
ot all students take the traditional four-year route to an undergraduate degree. Some, like Liam O’Brien, a junior dual-majoring in International Business and Finance, do it their way. It seems only natural for O’Brien to be carving his own path. He became intrigued by entrepreneurship in high school after reading books by Tim Ferriss, a U.S. entrepreneur, investor, author, and podcaster. “Ferriss' approaches on business and productivity are sometimes unorthodox but can be really effective if used appropriately,” O’Brien said.
“LIFE IS TOO SHORT TO BE SMALL.” TIM FERRISS
O’Brien and two former high school classmates—Danny Pakulski, now a Digital Media, Arts, and Technology graduate, and Simon Yahn, a film student at Rochester Institute of Technology— formed Oddity Productions, a videoproduction company. The company is set to hit the indie film circuit this year with Alexander the Brain, a short-film about bare-knuckles boxing set in the post-Civil War United States. O’Brien is the business manager for the company, which also does commercial
work, implementing a creative filmfocused approach to creating high-value video advertisements. That keeps him rather busy between—and sometimes during—classes. “Sometimes, I’m sitting in a business class and my phone will be buzzing with messages from clients,” he said. He has learned that communication is key to doing good business. “You have to be precise with your language and super-specific about everything, especially any sort of schedule changes,” he said. O’Brien isn’t rattled by a change of plans. Delays don’t mean derailment.
“GO OUT ON A LIMB. THAT’S WHERE THE FRUIT IS.” JIMMY CARTER
In the summer before his sophomore year, O’Brien secured an internship in São Paulo, Brazil. Having dual citizenship (O’Brien’s mother is Brazilian) and family he could live with in São Paulo provided the perfect opportunity for hands-on international learning. “Offering to work for free will help you get a foot in the door,” he said. “That’s how I started working at my first position in São Paulo,” he said. He was offered a three-month gig as an intern/office assistant at an asset management company. At the end of the summer, they offered him a full-time job. He accepted and had been working for the company for about a year when he met an entrepreneur who inspired another turn of events.
“ A generous donation of industry-leading video equipment by the Black family of Erie has enabled our company’s growth, and also the development of Behrend’s Digital Media, Arts, and Technology program Liam O’Brien is a junior dual-majoring in International Business and Finance. 6
O’Brien and two former high school classmates—Danny Pakulski, center, now a Digital Media, Arts, and Technology graduate, and Simon Yahn, left, a film student at Rochester Institute of Technology—formed Oddity Productions, a filmmaking and advertising company.
The entrepreneur was starting a consulting business to help tech companies scale their operations for Latin America. “He invited another person and me to help launch the company—Ocidente Tech—and I had to learn fast,” O’Brien said. “This experience taught me tough lessons about how to manage myself and a small team, how to build professional relationships, and how to fail and recover fast. I couldn’t have asked for a better ‘gap year’ experience.” When he returned to the United States, O’Brien jumped right back into college and his work at Oddity. “I spend a lot of time working on business development, building our professional network, and maintaining
our ‘back office’ operations such as the website, social media, and client contracts,” he said. The company is in the black and has a growing list of happy clients. But Oddity Productions’ founders have aspirations beyond making money.
“WE RISE BY LIFTING OTHERS.” ROBERT INGERSOLL
“We really want to build the film industry in Erie,” O’Brien said. “We have nearly every setting you could want here—forests, downtown, beaches, farms—and we have every season. Erie can and should be a destination for filmmakers.” Not only do they want to attract filmmakers to Erie, they want to help build them.
O’Brien is a driving force behind BOLD Media Group—a Behrend club that will teach students how to use high-end video equipment available through Behrend’s Open Laboratory for Digital Creations (BOLD-C), an outreach program of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences. “Through the club, we hope to facilitate cross-disciplinary collaboration between Digital Media, Arts, and Technology and Marketing majors to create speculative and real-world digital assets and advertisements for companies, with the goal of eventually taking on commercial work, contributing to Behrend’s Open Lab style of learning,” he said.
and the creation of the BOLD Media Group. Our involvement with the college will continue after graduation. We plan to provide opportunities for Behrend students on our film sets.” — Liam O’Brien 7
BLACK SCHOOL LAUNCHES
New Center for Family Business D
oug Neckers is sort of a unicorn: As a third-generation leader of a family-owned business, he navigated one of the most difficult transitions a business may face. Just 30 percent of family-run companies continue into a second generation. Even fewer than that—12 percent—continue into a third. Neckers is president and CEO of Maplevale Farms, which distributes food and kitchen products to restaurants, schools, and assisted-living facilities in Pennsylvania, New York, and Ohio. His grandfather, Norman Neckers, founded the business in 1951. Today, Maplevale has 200 employees and a line of nearly 10,000 food, paper, and cleaning products. Neckers spends much of his work time looking forward, positioning the business for the moment he no longer is in the president’s office. “It can be a challenge to set aside time to plan for the future of the business,” he said. “And yet, at this point, my greatest contribution to the business is ensuring that it continues, and that we do all the things we need to do for the business to not just survive but thrive.” Lately, he’s been relying on a new resource: The Center for Family Business at Penn State Behrend. The center, an outreach effort of the Black School of Business, is building a network of family-owned businesses, backed by the expertise of Black School faculty, to help members navigate issues related to family dynamics, financing, and succession
Dr. Christopher Harben, left, and Doug Neckers, president and CEO of Maplevale Farms.
planning, among other topics. “Family businesses are the backbone of the U.S. economy,” said Dr. Greg Filbeck, director of the Black School. “Because they often hire neighbors and friends, and even other family members, those business owners are committed to their employees. They feel acutely responsible for them, and for the community around them. “That sense of responsibility can, over
time, become a burden on the business,” Filbeck said. “Too often, business owners think they have to fix every problem themselves. They are so busy running the day-to-day business that they can’t always adequately plan for the long term. That’s where we can help.” The Center for Family Business will host monthly forums led by experts in the field and focused on the unique needs of family-run businesses, from the pressure
The Center for Family Business, an outreach effort of the Black School of Business, is building a network of family-owned businesses, backed by the expertise of Black School faculty—to help members 8
to hire and retain family members to succession planning and exit strategies. Members also will have access to Black School faculty experts and student researchers. The annual membership fee for center programs and support is $500. In addition to formal programming, the center will coordinate peer-group roundtable meetings for business owners. Those sessions will place members in a “safe harbor” environment where they can discuss common issues and concerns, said Dr. Christopher Harben, the Toudy Chair of Entrepreneurship and Family Business at the Black School and associate director of the Center for Family Business. “We really want this to be organic and driven by the needs and requests of our members,” Harben said. “Too many family business owners feel like they’re on an island, and it’s on them to come up with a solution for every problem. We want to build a network of support, so they can say, ‘This is something I faced today. Have you ever had to deal with that?’” The structure of the peer groups will blend businesses that, at first look, might not have much in common. That diversity can lead to more creative problem-solving, Harben said. “I think the peer aspect of this will be far more important than many family businesses may expect,” he said. “These folks have connections and networks of their own, but their spheres tend to be fairly tight, because their network is
focused on the immediate needs of the business.” The informal design of the peer-group meetings should lead to more creative approaches to common problems, Harben said. But it won’t happen overnight. “If you’re a business owner, you aren’t going to go into a room full of strangers
and open yourself up, asking for help or offering advice. Not the first day, anyway,” he said. “Our goal is to create a culture of trust among our members. That begins with the first conversation, and the realization that you are not alone in this.” For more information, call 814-898-6107 or email familybusiness@psu.edu.
The CFB Advisory Board has fifteen members including, from left, Matt Totzke, CEO of Larson Texts; Colleen Moore-Metzler, president and CEO of Moore Research Services; Doug Neckers, president and CEO of Maplevale Farms; Greg Yahn, owner and president of Advanced Finishing; and Casey Port, chief operating officer of Port Farms.
navigate issues related to family dynamics, financing, and succession planning, among other topics. For more information, call 814-898-6107 or email familybusiness@psu.edu. 9
THE GREEN DISPOSAL EFFECT H
ow many times have you cleaned out your closet and dropped the clothes into a donation bin on your way to the mall to buy new attire? DR. EUNJOO (EJ) HAN If you consider yourself to be a generally “sustainable” or “green” person, it’s likely you do it more often than someone who doesn’t think about sustainability at all, according to research done by Dr. Eunjoo (EJ) Han, assistant professor of marketing. If that behavior—donating older clothes for re-use and promptly buying brand-new clothes—sounds somewhat incongruent, that’s exactly what drew Han’s attention to the topic. She considers herself to be sustainability-minded and, yet inexplicably, found herself acting in opposition to her beliefs. “I buy recyclable coffee pods with high intentions of being sustainable, but I never seem to follow through, and I wondered: ‘Why is that?’” she said. With the help of two colleagues—Dr. Saerom Lee, assistant professor of marketing at the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada, and Dr. Sommer Kapitan, senior marketing lecturer at Auckland University of Technology in New Zealand—she studied the topic. The trio ran multiple lab and field experiments in Texas and New Zealand, where Han was located at the time. “We found that how unwanted items are disposed of influences future purchases and that if the person donates the items in what they consider to be a sustainable way, they feel justified in purchasing new items in a less sustainable way, such as buying new clothes at the mall instead of going to a consignment shop,” Han said. From a marketing perspective, this information about consumer behavior is useful. Policy makers, sustainability professionals, and nonprofit organizations 10
“ Some retailers tell customers if they bring in unwanted clothing, they will get a discount to use in the store. That type of ‘green messaging’ can be very effective with people who want to act in a sustainable way."
can use it to understand the downstream effect of donations and perhaps tweak messaging to change behaviors. “In our experiments, if we told people that not all of the items they donated would be recycled, they were less likely to go buy more,” Han said. On the flip side, retailers can use the information to attract sustainabilityminded consumers.
“Some retailers will collect donations and tell customers if they bring in unwanted clothing, they will get a discount to use in the store,” Han said. “That type of ‘green messaging’ can be very effective with people who want to act in a sustainable way. They like the idea of donating to charity and doing something good for someone else while doing something nice for themselves, too.”
Black School outreach website a resource for K-12 teachers
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he business classes Nicole Wethli teaches at Fairview Middle School begin with the basics: keyboarding, report formatting, and Excel. From there, the curriculum gets trickier: The Pennsylvania Department of Education requires twelve career-exploration activities—and an individualized career plan for every student—by the end of grade 8. Eight more are required by the end of grade 11. Wethli meets those requirements by bringing in guest speakers, including faculty members from the Black School of Business. “When students first think about going into business, they often think, ‘I’m going to have to sit behind a desk all day,’” Wethli said. “Not all careers in business are like that, of course, so it’s important for students to hear different perspectives, with real-life examples of how businesses operate. That encourages them to explore the many options that are available to them.” Last year brought a new challenge: COVID restrictions, which forced many schools, including Fairview’s, into a Zoom-based learning environment. Guest speakers no longer were an option.
The state requirements for career exploration were still in effect, however. To help meet that need, and to create a central platform for business-themed lesson plans, the Black School and a team from Behrend’s Center for Teaching and eLearning Initiatives developed a new outreach website with video and podcast content and classroom activities themed to different business topics, from accounting and economics to finance, management, and marketing. The site, sites.psu.edu/psbehrendbusinesstopics, is a free resource for teachers. It provides a library of K-12 video content and classroom-based activities. “We want this to be a resource for the local community,” said Dr. Mary Beth Pinto, professor of marketing and chair of the Black School’s outreach committee. She led the development of the website, which also includes content from Junior Achievement of Western Pennsylvania. The website features video presentations about financial literacy, student loans, social media marketing, and the costs of using credit cards. There also is a library of video podcasts, or “vodcasts,” which explore the value of networking, internships, and leadership traits, among other topics.
The videos feature Behrend faculty experts, as well as current students and alumni, including Jeff Blackman, a senior vice president at the Bravo, E!, and Syfy networks. In addition to video resources, teachers can download business-themed classroom-based activities—an ad-writing challenge for multicultural markets, for example, or a supply-chain simulation of Christmas-eve deliveries from the North Pole. They also can request customized presentations, including panel discussions with students in the Black School’s Business Ambassadors program. The Black School has made the website available to K-12 school districts across Erie County, including the Erie Catholic School System. It’s also being shared through Career Street, a career exploration network that is part of the Erie Together initiative. “Teachers really want to make these connections,” said Jennifer Nygaard Pontzer, the executive director of Career Street. “They want to provide opportunities for students to have true careerexploration experiences, but they don’t always know where to go. This website gives them options.”
Sites.psu.edu/psbehrendbusinesstopics is a free resource for teachers. It provides a library of K-12 video content and classroom-based activities. 11
Penn State Erie, The Behrend College Black School of Business 281 Burke Center 5101 Jordan Road Erie, PA 16563-1400
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GETTING BACK 2 BUSINESS
After a year of remote learning, the Black School of Business was eager to welcome students back to campus. The school hosted a “Back 2 Business” event at the start of the new academic year, inviting students and faculty members to meet in person, have a little fun, and enjoy Penn State’s celebrated Berkey Creamery ice cream. Representatives from the school’s student organizations were also on hand to recruit. Nearly 200 students attended the event.
Black School of Business News is published annually and provided free to alumni and friends of Penn State Behrend Black School of Business by the Office of Strategic Communications, William V. Gonda, wvg2@psu.edu, senior director. Editor: Heather Cass, hjc13@psu.edu. Designer: Martha Ansley Campbell, mac30@psu.edu. This publication is available in alternative media on request. Penn State is an equal opportunity, affirmative action employer, and is committed to providing employment opportunities to all qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability or protected veteran status. U.Ed. EBO 22-185 All of the photos in this publication were taken prior to January 2020, were self-submitted, and/or were taken with high social distancing measures in place.
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