The University of Maryland Eastern Shore has embarked on a new branding initiative. The effort includes a new logo that includes the university’s hawk mascot and identifies the school as a historically Black university.
“Since I’ve been here, we’ve had about 12 logos all around the campus and in different formats,” said Heidi M. Anderson, president of the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. “One of the things that always bothered me was we are a proud HBCU, and when I go places with that ‘M’ logo, people didn’t know where I was from.”
“We discovered many students and prospective students and parents had no idea UMES was an HBCU, so it was important to incorporate that as well as the fact that we have been here since 1886, long before many of our sister (University System of Maryland) universities,” added Alissa Carr, the associate vice president and director of marketing and external relations at the university.
In addition to the updated insignia, a new tagline, ‘Soar Above and Beyond,’ was unveiled. “To watch a hawk so majestically soar and he goes higher and higher, that’s what we’re doing too,” President Anderson said. “We’re excelling higher and higher. Higher quality, higher goals, higher enrollment.”
The complete updating of on-campus signage will take time due to supply chain issues, Anderson said.
