Corporate Scholarship Spotlight: PepsiCo
PepsiCo and The School of Labor and Employment Relations have a long-standing relationship providing Corporate Scholarships to LER students and providing meaningful summer internship and career opportunities to students. More than 50 LER students and alumni are currently employed throughout their organization in roles ranging from intern to vice president.
This spring's PepsiCo Scholar is Francesca Brumm, who entered the MHRIR program in January. Before graduate school, Francesca worked as a production assistant on television shows including Grey’s Anatomy and Review and as a technical product manager for Sidebench Studios. Francesca is originally from Madison, Wisconsin and received her BBA in marketing and international business from the University of Wisconsin.
In her first semester, her submission to the 7th Annual Cornell HR Review Essay Competition was selected as the winning essay. The essay, "Telework is work: Navigating the new normal" is available for review online at http://www.cornellhrreview.org/telework-is-work-navigating-the-new-normal/.
PepsiCo currently sponsors two scholarships for incoming LER students, and has been a partner in the program for over two decades. "The University of Illinois LER Program has been integral to our pipeline of HR talent into PepsiCo. We have found that these students adapt extremely well to our PepsiCo HR Model," states Tim Brinkmann, Vice President, HR, East Division and AM 90. "Our relationship with LER is an important one. It not only leads to a great pipeline of quality students, but also allows us to share industry human resource trends and learn about the latest academic thinking in the world of human resources. Through this relationship and the scholarship program, we have built our reputation as an employer of choice with this talent pool and we are proud to be involved and partner with the LER program."
LER congratulates Francesca on her success, and thanks PepsiCo for their longstanding support of the program.