Annunciata Williams
Staff Writer
Four Awards of Excellence from the Council of Advancement and Support of Education have been presented to the University Advancement office at the University of La Verne.
CASE is a professional association that recognizes institutes for programs that have a lasting impact.
“It’s unusual to receive four awards in one year which is why I was so excited” Jean Bjerke, vice president for advancement, said.
The Office of Advancement received one gold award for their Peeps Program, one silver award for their Spotted Pig Campaign and two Bronze awards for the Presidential Inauguration and the “It’s Amandatory Blog.”
The Peeps Program was an effort to get students to follow the new University President on Twitter.
“(Amanda Hanson, assistant to the vice president for donor stewardship and public relations) deserves all the credit for coming up with the idea, the rest of us just picked it up and ran with it” Charles Bentley, director of public relations, said.
Bentley said Hanson came to his office one day and said she thought she had an idea.
“I thought it was brilliant than, and I’m telling you its brilliant now” Bentley said.
“We wanted a way to get her connected with the campus” Hanson said.
“When I was first presented with the Peeps concept, I was a little bit skeptical” Devorah Lieberman, University of La Verne president, said.
However, after everything was explained to her, she changed her mind.
“I thought that it was fun and creative” Lieberman said. “I like the concept and continue to use it.”
“We entered some stuff in the past, but usually we don’t enter these things” Bentley said. “Everyone was excited about winning so many awards.”
“We came in ahead of both USC and Redlands” Bjerke said.
The Spotted Pig Campaign was also a success, formulated by Trish Ciccoianni and Susan Barton. This won the University a Silver Award.
It was such a success that the Spotted Pig Campaign will be taking place again with the Spring Spotted Pig Collection Carnival on May 3.
One of the Bronze awards is for the Presidential Inauguration, which was put on by over one hundred staff and volunteers, the University of Advancement Office, the Public relationship Office, and Bianca Romero.
The other Bronze award is for the “It’s Amandatory Blog,” created by Hanson to keep everyone up to date on the renovation of the Morgan Auditorium.
She used funny stories and nostalgic posts to keep everyone interested and involved in the process.
“Basically everyone in the department was involved in these programs” Bjerke said.
Everyone worked together and everyone had something to do with making these programs a reality, Hanson said.
Bjerke gave a pizza lunch for all who worked to make these programs possible.
“The simplicity is what makes it so wonderful” Bjerke said.
Annunciata Williams can be reached at annunciata.williams@laverne.edu.
