Brand Standards

Key Messages

Gettysburg College has a distinct institutional identity defined by our brand positioning statement:

Gettysburg College is a college deeply rooted in the American experience. It was born of democratic values, strong optimism, and the firm conviction that only a liberal arts education fully awakens and prepares people to lead lives of enlightened contribution to a free society. Gettysburg stands as witness and authority to the depths of devotion required to confirm the nation and continue perfecting its promise. This unique perspective has long shaped and strengthened the College's development as an academically superior institution, modern in facility and pedagogy, honoring of service to others, and committed to the preparation of the whole person. Gettysburg College is a highly motivated community of intentional students, faculty, and administrators who come together in this place to build in each other a passion and capacity for the responsibility of citizenship and the opportunity of leadership, within a community, a nation, and a world.Four foundational messages emanate from our positioning statement. These messages should be used consistently by all of us who represent the college to stakeholders and to external audiences:

• Gettysburg College is an intellectually vigorous, national liberal arts
  institution that graduates critical thinkers and effective communicators
  who are motivated to lead lives of contribution to the world in
  which they live.
• Gettysburg College is committed to the preparation of the whole person,
  and to providing a rich experience that serves the intellectual, physical
  and social needs of the members of its community.
• Gettysburg College is inspired by history.
• Gettysburg College is a robust community of highly motivated and
  spirited students who define the life of the college.

Work with these messages as you develop your own presentation of Gettysburg College. Whenever possible, refer to all four messages, even as you emphasize whichever may be the most meaningful to the audience you are addressing. Use the proof points provided with each key message for emphasis. And then add your own anecdotes and personal stories. In this way, you can be a powerful personal ambassador of the brand, while we, as a community, can work together to achieve consistency in the messages we deliver.


Gettysburg College is an intellectually vigorous, national liberal arts institution that graduates critical thinkers and effective communicators who are motivated to lead lives of contribution to the world in which they live.

The mission statement of Gettysburg College recognizes the power of a liberal arts education. The intent of our curriculum is to develop lifelong learners who are able to process information in complex ways, are skilled in communication, and are prepared for the responsibilities of local and global citizenship. Here, students develop critical thinking skills and consider well-argued points of view from multiple perspectives. Gettysburg students learn to construct cogent arguments and engage in intellectual and artistic expression. And ultimately, they acquire the knowledge and moral dispositions that enable them to be committed members of their neighborhoods, professions, country, and our global society.

Current proof points and supportive messages

• Faculty are distinguished scholars; 95% hold a Ph.D. or the highest degree in their field. They are enthusiastic teacher/scholars, and our student to faculty ratio of 11:1 means they are able to serve as effective personal and intellectual mentors.
• Gettysburg College has been ranked consistently in the top tier of the nation's liberal arts colleges.
• First-Year Seminars are taught by the College's most experienced faculty and the course syllabi reflect their most creative thinking. This innovative seminar program enables faculty to engage students in cross-disciplinary thinking that does not easily fit into the standard curriculum.
• J. Michael Bishop, a 1957 Gettysburg College graduate, is chancellor of the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF), and a recipient the 200X Nobel Prize in Medicine. He was also one of eight winners of the National Medal of Science who were selected in a variety of fields for pioneering scientific research, innovations and technologies that give the United States its global economic edge.
• Gettysburg College economics Professor Ann Harper Fender was awarded a Fulbright Scholar Award to conduct research at the Economics University of Varna in Bulgaria for the 2004-05 academic year. The Fulbright Scholar Award, established in 1946 under legislation introduced by the late United States senator from Arkansas, J. William Fulbright, recognizes academic or professional achievement and leadership.
• Archana Dinesh Patel, a 2003 Gettysburg College graduate from Alexandria, Va., received an award to support postgraduate research in India from the Fulbright U.S. Student Program. A paralegal at O'Melveny and Myers law firm in Washington, D.C., Patel traveled for nine months in India to research the impact of microfinance programs on the political empowerment of women.
• Luke Norris, a member of the class 2006, was awarded the prestigious Rhodes and Marshall Scholarships in the fall of 2005. Luke will study in Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar.

In the voice of the brand
At Gettysburg, the individual is not dwarfed by the institution, but magnified by the experience; not mired in indifference, but raised up in responsibility; not waiting in the wings, but standing on the world's stage.

Gettysburg College is committed to the preparation of the whole person, and to providing a rich experience that serves the intellectual, physical, and social needs of the members of its community.

At Gettysburg College, we believe that the balance of mind, body, and spirit is essential to a good education, a fulfilling career, and a satisfying life. At Gettysburg, learning takes place on many levels and in multiple venues - a classroom, the laboratory, on the stage and fields of play, in community centers, at a corporate office, or in parklands - located down the street or across the world. We are a vibrant community that rewards teamwork, encourages perseverance, and honors achievement. Our rigorous academic program is enriched by service-learning assignments that blend citizenship and public service into the undergraduate experience. Our campus offers numerous student clubs and organizations, intercollegiate athletic teams, venues for visual and performing arts, and access to a wide range of stimulating events. Students, staff, and faculty interact daily in activities throughout campus that support this balanced approach to life.

Current proof points and supportive messages

• Gettysburg College competes successfully in the Centennial Conference, one of the top NCAA Division III conferences in the country, garnering awards for top overall athletic performance in the conference.
• Generations of Gettysburg students have made profound differences in the lives of other people. In keeping with this tradition, the college's Center for Public Service coordinates a myriad of community service opportunities. The Center, created in 1991, was the first of its kind at a college campus and is a model for other programs. Students have participated in both domestic and international service-learning projects, ranging from the Navajo Indians to working on coffee cooperatives in the mountains of Nicaragua.
• An example of a typical First-Year Seminar experience: As part of a class entitled Poor Children in Affluent America students traveled to inner city Baltimore and met with community leaders, planted trees, and experienced first-hand some of the problems being studied in class.
• Kenny Williams '05, who participated in the College's first study abroad program in South Africa, went ski diving, bungee jumping, shark diving, waterfall sliding, canoeing with crocodiles, hiking through the mountains, and driving past elephants, rhinos, and giraffes on a safari. He said he also learned more about
  human nature and life than he ever thought possible - and made new friends along the way.
• It's hard to pinpoint the genesis of Kinsey Wright's passion for all things Chinese. Her hometown, ten minutes west of Mark Twain's birthplace in Hannibal, Missouri, holds no clue to her fascination. But from an early age she wanted to learn all there was to learn about China. Now a junior at Gettysburg, Kinsey was attracted by the College's interdisciplinary approach to Asian Studies and the flexibility to custom tailor a major that would fit her far-flung interests. To study in China, she has received a Freeman Award for Study Abroad in Asia and a Gilman Scholarship.
• Four Gettysburg College students traveled to Egypt and China to participate in two of the largest Model United Nations (MUN) conferences in the world. Juniors David Santos, Matea Migic, and senior Ammayle Kasi first attended the world's second largest MUN conference in Cairo, Egypt. The students represented
  countries that comprise the Security Council, Commission on Human Rights, and World Bank. Santos and Migic then traveled with junior Jesper Odum to the largest MUN conference in the world, co-hosted by Harvard University and Peking University, in Beijing, China, in March 2006.

In the voice of the brand
Students and teachers succeed together, knowing that to be a fully realized individual, one must first be fully engaged, and then all things are possible.

Gettysburg College is inspired by history.

Every new member of the Gettysburg College community inherits a historic lineage, and assumes a special responsibility for it. The students, faculty, and staff of Pennsylvania College of Gettysburg, as Gettysburg College was known in 1863, not only experienced first-hand the most famous battle of the U.S. Civil War, they were among those to whom Abraham Lincoln spoke directly when he declared at Gettysburg: "we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation shall have a new birth of freedom." Today, Gettysburg College - matured by its long history and cognizant of Lincoln's admonishment that we should take "increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion" - embraces our institutional responsibility to advance understanding of what occurred in this place, and by so doing, to inspire greater wisdom as we address the challenges of our modern world.

Current proof points and supportive messages

• A core value from our mission statement: "The power of a liberal arts education to help students develop critical thinking skills, a broad vision, effective communications, a sense of the interrelatedness of all knowledge, sensitivity to the human condition, and a global perspective, all necessary to enable students to realize their full potential for responsible citizenship."
• Richard Gilder and Lewis Lehrman, together with Gettysburg College Fluhrer Professor of Civil War Studies Gabor Boritt, established the Lincoln Prize in 1990. It is the nation's most generous award in the field of American history. The Gilder Lehrman Institute has amassed one of the nation's greatest private collections of American historical documents and devotes itself to education by supporting magnet schools, teacher education, curriculum development, exhibitions, and publications.
• Gettysburg College history professor Michael Birkner accepted an invitation to chair the 2006 Pulitzer Prize History Jury. Birkner served previously as a member of the 2003 jury. He said he felt "honored" to serve a second time. Birkner and two other historians will review nominated books and recommend three potential winners to the prize's board of directors, which makes the final decision.
• The First-Year Walk is a new tradition of the college established by Lindsay Morlock ¿03, as a way to honor her alma mater's intimate relationship with history. Every fall, during Orientation Week, the newest students of Gettysburg College are invited to walk together the same path taken by the students of 1863 who accompanied Abraham Lincoln to Cemetery Hill for the dedication of the Soldier's National Cemetery. Once assembled at the site of Lincoln's original oration a person of distiction, selected by students, delivers the Gettysburg Address to the incoming class.
• From President Katherine Haley Will's 2004 inaugural speech: We have "been summoned by the past to engage whole-heartedly in the conversation of today."

In the voice of the brand
One hundred and seventy-five years of liberty ring from the clock tower to the classrooms to the hallowed fields beyond, celebrating the ideas, deeds, and creations that continue to resonate with the inspiration of freedom.

Gettysburg College is a robust community of highly motivated and spirited students who define the life of the college.

Gettysburg College offers an unparalleled student experience in that students are true, contributing citizens of the Gettysburg community. Students take ownership of their educations and are active in shaping their college. They abide by one of our proudest traditions, the Honor Code, a profound statement of trust, mutual respect, and self-governance. They make decisions about campus life and manage an ever-growing number of clubs and activities. Faculty and students treat one another as intellectual colleagues and peers. The students of Gettysburg College are purposeful, involved, responsible, and mutually supportive. They make their mark on the college during their years on campus, and stay lifelong, loyal guardians of the college throughout their lives.

Current proof points and supportive messages

• Members of the Student Senate, which was established in 1910, strive for "the betterment of student conditions at Gettysburg and providing in every possible way for the maintenance of student morale." Senators work diligently towards achieving the goals that they themselves set and provide the means for close cooperation amongst the student body, the faculty, and the administration on questions and concerns of the common interest; and secure the democratic right to self-government for the student body.
• The Career Distinction program, established to assist students prepare for their careers, utilizes the College's network of alumni, parents and friends to help students discover the vast array of options open to those with a liberal arts education.
• Students are engaged in high-level research with their professors and often present findings at national
  conferences. For example, collaborating closely with her faculty advisor, a Gettysburg College student presented her research on nuclear power at a nationwide undergraduate conference in Washington, D.C.
• "To say is to do. What will you say? In your four years here, what will you say? What will you do?" - Professor Scott Hancock, from his recent Convocation Speech.
  
  The Office of Experiential Education facilitates adventure-based workshops, trainings, trips, and instructional seminars for the campus community, alumni, and their family members. Its mission is to
  provides a learning environment that is dedicated to the development of each student.
• Gettysburg College offers Study Abroad Programs all over the world, as well as Domestic Programs within the United States. Some programs are Integrated Programs, where students study with students from the host country. Forty-nine percent of the Class of 2005 spent a year, semester, or summer on an off-campus program.

In the voice of the brand
The elements of family and humanity, optimism and intellect, wisdom and passion bond to form people of extraordinary capacity and energy.