The annual ringing of Founders Bell is one of the most prominent events of Daemen University’s Founders Celebration. This year’s ceremony marked the institution’s 75th anniversary and the community came together in a special way to ring in this milestone.
Opening the ceremony, Executive Vice President and Provost Michael Brogan honored the institution’s tradition of academic excellence, and reflected on Daemen’s recent growth with an eye toward the future.
President Gary Olson emphasized the student-centered focus of the university.
“It is the exceptional dedication of our faculty and staff that has fostered this unusual level of personal attention to students,” Olson highlighted for the gathered crowd. “It is what sets us apart.”
Seven special guests each rang the bell, denoting the decades since Daemen’s founding as Rosary Hill College in 1947. The honorary bell ringers included Faculty Senate President Lisa Parshall, Student Government Association President Courtney Meredith, Trustee Jo-Anne Grabowski ’73, Professor Emeritus George Seifert, and David Johnson ’16.
In a special twist to the traditional ceremony, 75 lucky community members – who signed up via a campus wide lottery – were able to follow the seven traditional bell ringers in a ceremony of their own. One by one, Brogan announced the names of community members from across the campus as they approached for their own turn to pull the rope and sound the bell.