On May 8, 2008, the HBS Club of Atlanta held its local celebration of the school's 100th anniversary. The program consisted of an afternoon social enterprise forum at the Atlanta History Center, and an evening cocktail reception and banquet at Cherokee Town Club.

The afternoon Social Enterprise Forum featured a vibrant panel discussion on the changing landscape of social enterprise moderated by HBS Professor Allen Grossman. The panelists were Pierre Ferrari (Chairman of the Board, Ben & Jerry's Homemade), Alicia Philipp (President, Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta), and Deborah Richardson (President of the Atlanta Women's Foundation and former HBS Club of Atlanta scholarship recipient).

The evening Centennial Reception and Dinner celebrated the Past, Present, and Future of HBS and the HBS Club of Atlanta. Perhaps the highlights of the evening session were the keynote speech by Professor Grossman looking at the future of the Harvard Business School, and the awarding of scholarships by the club to 4 local nonprofit leaders.

This year's celebration continues a more than 20-year tradition for the club. Every year since 1985, the club has held an awards banquet at which it honored a local business leader. Every year since 1997, the club has also awarded a full scholarship for a week-long executive education program on the campus of the school to the leaders of some of Atlanta's nonprofit organizations. All tolled, in the past 11 years, the club has awarded 43 scholarships, and this year they were joined by 4 more recipients: Emily Ellison (Executive Director of Literacy Action), Rutha Greene (Executive Director of Tapestry Youth Ministries), Martha Talbott (Director of Programs, The Atlanta Women's Foundation), and Beth Vann (Executive Director of Decatur Cooperative Ministry).

This year's Centennial celebration is believed to be the largest gathering of HBS alumni ever in Atlanta. More than 65 HBS alumni registered for the afternoon forum, and almost 100 HBS alumni attended the evening celebration, in addition to 15 of the club's past scholarship recipients. The evening was made very special by the fact that 25 of our club's past presidents, dating all the way back to the Class of 1947, attended.

The HBS Club of Atlanta's local celebration is part of a "global outreach" that embraces HBS alumni around the world through local gatherings. More than 50 clubs and associations have held or will be holding a Centennial gathering of one sort or another, ranging from a quiet cocktail reception, to educational programs and symposia for nonprofit leaders, to formal banquets.

These local celebrations lead up to the school's official centennial on October 8, 2008. The centennial will be marked on campus by a worldwide business summit, which runs from October 12-14, 2008. The business summit will feature a keynote speech by Bill Gates, a roundtable discussion on leadership in the 21st century moderated by Charlie Rose, a speech by Harvard President Drew Faust, and a host of other topics of significant interest to business. Click here for more details on the Business Summit.