EBV, IVMF visit NYSE and ring closing bell

On Monday, Jan. 9, representatives from Syracuse University’s Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Veterans with Disabilities (EBV) and the Institute for Veterans and Military Families (IVMF), the EBV Foundation and EBV corporate sponsors PepsiCo, Walmart and Humana visited the New York Stock Exchange. Their visit highlighted the work the EBV program and foundation are undertaking to provide cutting-edge entrepreneurship training to open the door to small business ownership to post-9/11 veterans with service-related disabilities.

EBV graduate Elizabeth Perez-Halperin, president and founder of GC Green, a post-9/11 service-disabled veteran-owned green build general contracting and consulting firm, rang the NYSE Closing Bell. Perez-Halperin, a graduate of the EBV at Texas A&M, was joined on the bell podium by EBV founder and IVMF executive director Mike Haynie, fellow EBV program graduates and representatives from the EBV Foundation and corporate sponsors.

“It is an honor that the EBV took part in the closing bell ceremony at the NYSE. We are pleased by this recognition and thrilled about our ongoing relationship with our corporate sponsors who help us provide opportunities for meaningful and needed training in entrepreneurship for our nation’s returning veterans, veteran business owners and their families,” says Haynie.

Since its founding in 2007, 450 veterans from across the nation have graduated from the EBV, which has spurred the creation of more than 200 new veteran-owned businesses. Founded at SU’s Whitman School of Management and operated under the auspices of the IVMF, the EBV program is offered through a national consortium of eight world-class schools across the country, including SU; the University of California, Los Angeles; Florida State University; Texas A&M University; Purdue University; the University of Connecticut; Louisiana State University; and Cornell University.