| 2009 Excellence in Entrepreneurship Banquet |
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The fourth annual Excellence in Entrepreneurship Awards Banquet was held on Thursday, April 16, 2009, in the Magnolia Room of Reynolda Hall, thanks to the generous sponsorship of Southern Community Bank. The Excellence in Entrepreneurship Awards were presented to nine undergraduate student ventures and two faculty members. The Excellence in Entrepreneurship Awards were presented by previous and current co-Presidents of the Entrepreneurship Society, Afton Vechery, Javin Hutchinson, and Stephanie Edwards. The Excellence in Entrepreneurship Awards were created to recognize students, faculty, and staff who have exhibited extraordinary achievements in entrepreneurship over the past year. Nominated by their peers, these individuals embody the entrepreneurial spirit in thought and action and serve as an inspiration to all of us. Student Awards The first Excellence in Entrepreneurship Award for an Artistic Venture was presented to freshman Aubrey Vaughan for her venture Vaughan Jewelry. Aubrey has taken her love of arts and crafts and turned it into a growing business, selling jewelry, including many handmade items. Aubrey is growing as an entrepreneur by combining her personal hobby with her developing business skills. The second Artistic Venture Award was given to graduate students and Entrepreneurship Fifth Year Fellows Bill Brown and Jessie Vogel for their venture, Stuffed Robot. The venture was founded in 2006 to manufacture and sell plush robot toys and has since grown to incorporate several of their other toys and online creations. Jessie and Bill recently debuted their first mass-produced run of the robot Mellowtron which you can purchase from their website www.stuffedrobot.com. There were two awards for technical ventures. The first Excellence in Entrepreneurship Award for a Technical Venture went to senior Rob Laughter, who has combined his interest in communication, web design and entrepreneurship to create his venture Connective Insights. Connective Insights is a market research consultancy that aims to take “ownership” of market research in the college demographic, linking firms that develop or sell technology to a student audience. Rob has already contracted two clients, and is on the way to realizing his venture’s goal. The second Excellence in Entrepreneurship Award for a Technical Venture went to junior Tim Griesser for his venture Web Capital Solutions. Tim has only recently launched his venture, but has made significant progress in the past few months to develop his website design and development consultancy. During this short time, he has developed or is in the process of developing several websites for Wake Forest entrepreneurs, local small businesses, and Student Government candidates. This year’s Excellence in Entrepreneurship Award for a Scientific Venture went to Wesley Johnson, Lacey Robinson, and Afton Vechery for their venture Terrafinity. Terrafinity is a student-led initiative to manufacture biodiesel using excess grease from campus dining facilities. The venture is actively working to establish a process that would enable college campuses to manufacture and utilize biofuel for campus operations. Terrafinity continues to work to establish a secure on-campus production facility and continues to assist in the research to develop a catalyst that would increase the efficiency of the manufacturing process. There were two awards this year for the Excellence in Entrepreneurship Award for Commercial Ventures. The first award went to Ryan Edwards for his venture, Booty Wax. Over the past several years, Ryan has conducted over two hundred experiments to develop his own proprietary line of organic surfboard wax. He has recently established a manufacturing studio in Kernersville, NC and is ramping up production for summer sales along the North Carolina and Southeast coast. The second Excellence in Entrepreneurship Award for a Commercial Venture went to Rolandas Hauser for his venture, Word Apparel. Launched last summer, Word Apparel has designed close to a dozen different hat and t-shirt designs targeting skateboarding and snowboarding enthusiasts. The venture will be expanding production this summer through a partnership with a Charlotte-based manufacturer and hopes to significantly expand the website and product line by the fall of this year. This year’s Excellence in Entrepreneurship Award for a Service-based Venture went to Tyler Pruitt for his venture, Wake Audio. Demonstrating his great passion for entrepreneurship, Tyler has developed a successful on-campus speaker rental business. The successful venture provides a much needed turn-key service for organizations, offices, and clubs planning events and concerts on campus. This year’s Excellence in Entrepreneurship Award for an Online Venture went to junior Brett Apter and sophomore Ben Comer for MySavu, Inc. MySavu advertises local businesses to Wake Forest University students on their website mysavu.com. MySavu seeks to bridge the gap between Winston-Salem businesses and the Wake Forest community, creating what they have termed a “communiversity.” Both Ben and Brett have demonstrated determination and commitment to the success of MySavu including their recent participation in the Babcock Elevator Competition. Faculty Awards Lynn Book, Visiting Associate Professor of Theatre and Dance and Director of the Program for Creativity and Innovation, received the Faculty Award for Program Development. During her four years at Wake Forest, Lynn Book has developed many remarkable courses in creativity, innovation, entrepreneurship, and inter-disciplinary dialogue. In addition, she has worked closely with many student entrepreneurs and developed a strong program in creativity – one of the hallmarks of Wake Forest’s entrepreneurship program. However, her Excellence in Entrepreneurship award was presented to her this year for her recent work in producing the extraordinarily successful and visionary Creativity Symposium. She raised money and brought together a host of faculty, staff, and students as advisors, panelists, and volunteers to organize this national event. She spent two years determining and securing international speakers, artists, and panelists who came together for 3 very full days and generated with each other and conference attendees ideas and conversations that will continue far into the future. This year’s Faculty Award for Mentoring went to John Wigodsky. Mr. Wigodsky started volunteering with the Wake Forest entrepreneurship program about two years ago. Since that time he has mentored dozens of student entrepreneurs either through their work on independent studies, or through their involvement with the University Center for Entrepreneurship. He has been instrumental in helping students to conduct market research, analyze new business opportunities, develop business strategies and marketing plans. He has personally coached many student teams to prepare for business plan competitions and has become a mentor and confidant to many of our best student entrepreneurial ventures. The Entrepreneurship Service Leadership Award was presented to Mrs. Lisa Burton, Grants Administrator for the Office of Entrepreneurship and Liberal Arts. As Bren Varner eloquently stated, “During the past five years, Lisa Burton became a co-founder in what is no less than an entrepreneurial venture of its own: the Office of Entrepreneurship & Liberal Arts at Wake Forest University. She has managed the office, handled the financial and reporting aspects of our grants, and registered and advised hundreds of students who have taken our classes and minored in Entrepreneurship and Social Enterprise. She has helped to coordinate events, programs, and local and national conferences and provided countless hours assisting many of our other faculty and staff members. Many people often comment about how they just don’t know how we’ve been able to accomplish what we have over the past five years, how we’ve been able to grow the program to what it is today. Our success and accomplishment is in no small part due to Lisa Burton and her selfless and never-tiring efforts to support this program.” The Entrepreneurship Society and the Office of Entrepreneurship and Liberal Arts would like to congratulate the award winners and thank all involved for their participation in continuing the tradition of recognizing Excellence in Entrepreneurship at Wake Forest. |