2024 WISE From All Sides
Fall of 2024 marked the largest WISE Symposium to date, welcoming over 15 new chapters, 6 industry partners across the country and hundreds of supply chain students from the University of Arkansas and visiting schools. This event resulted in the addition of 7 new chapters and helped connect dozens of students to Fortune 500 industry partners in the greater Northwest Arkansas area.
This year, we added only 1 new tower as we've learned that, though they are easy to transport, they are extremely time-consuming to assemble. We will need to remedy this problem for the 2025 Symposium. Besides this small inconvenience, the 2024 event has been the most successful event to date!
2023 WISE Changes Chains
In Fall 2023, the WISE Symposium theme was updated to emphasize the concept behind its logo: chain links. Titled "WISE Changes Chains," the theme highlighted the connections formed among young women in the University of Arkansas's supply chain program and celebrated the emergence of new WISE chapters across the country. This theme underscored the importance of female support in the supply chain industry and encouraged continued collaboration and relationships between our institutions.
Issues I encountered in 2022 were avoided this year, such as the high costs of printing due to using too many colors and oversized graphics, were addressed through adjustments like refining designs to four-color prints and optimizing graphic sizes. Additionally, we added two new 8-foot towers to match previous iterations, incorporating a fresh color combination with two shades of red that we echoed across other materials.
2022 A WISER Future for Supply Chain
In Fall 2022, as an intern at the Walton College, I had the opportunity to work on the WISE Symposium, contributing to the development of its visual identity from the ground up. The only existing element was a logo designed by Stephanie Thomas’s son, which we refined to establish brand consistency. Building upon this, I created a comprehensive suite of assets for the first official Symposium, establishing the foundational visual language and setting the tone for the WISE brand. Through a series of iterations, we developed a cohesive and impactful brand identity that has become central to the Symposium’s presence and messaging.
This project encompassed the design and production of a variety of branded materials, including t-shirts, banners, posters, tablecloths, pull-up displays, step-and-repeat backdrops, social media graphics, PowerPoint presentations, and more. To make the setup portable and event-friendly, I selected 8-foot, four-sided towers that were easy to transport. Through this process, I gained valuable experience working with printers, ordering samples, and managing files efficiently for production.
