In February, Bruce ‘Beau’ Jacobson was awarded the J. Edward Zollinger Award for Most Outstanding Senior at the national Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity’s Carlson Leadership Academy in Oklahoma City. This award is only given to five seniors in the fraternity across the U.S. A chapter must nominate a student to be considered for the award, and then a fellow fraternity brother must write a letter stating why the nominee deserves it. Resumes and transcripts are also taken into account.
Alex DeRossi, Texas Iota Sigma Phi Epsilon president.
Jacobson, an accounting major from Grapevine, Texas, is currently in a five-year program at Texas Tech University, which includes a master’s in accounting. Jacobson said he will move to Dallas to work at Ernst and Young Accounting after he graduates.
Beau Jacobson is receiving a Master of Science in Accounting from the Rawls College of Business.
Alex DeRossi, the Texas Iota Sigma Phi Epsilon chapter president from Flower Mound, Texas, said he met Jacobson when he joined SigEp in 2013, and in his time with the fraternity, he has served with Jacobson on the executive board and through general fraternity events.
DeRossi said the Tech chapter sends the executive board and a few other members to attend the Carlson Leadership Academy, a regional leadership conference, every year to participate in team-leading activities. This year, he said, the Texas Iota chapter nominated Jacobson for the conference award.
“It’s awarded regionally to these different seniors that possess all the values that are true to SigEp — virtue, diligence and brotherly love — and he marks all three of those off his checklist. He has a co-op right now, so he definitely portrays SigEp in the greatest light and is a great fraternity brother.”
Beau Jacobson receiving the J. Edward Zollinger Award. Photo courtesy of SigEp Headquarters
Jacobson said the award is named after a past fraternity member, J. Edward Zollinger, who is known for the great things he did for SigEp.
In an email, a spokesman from the fraternity’s national headquarters, Rob Jepson, said the Zollinger Family endowment recognizes an outstanding senior in each district as well as provides a scholarship to a chapter-selected sophomore in his honor.
“The recipient of the Zollinger Outstanding Senior Award epitomizes our cardinal principles and the “Balanced Man” ideal. He stewards his time wisely in an effort to offer his best to his chapter, his campus and his community,” Jepson said. “Most importantly, he serves as a role model for other brothers to emulate. When a brother is awarded the Zollinger Outstanding Senior Award, he is also given the opportunity to award a $1,000 scholarship, funded by SigEp, to a younger member of his chapter.”
DeRossi said Randy Staff, a key volunteer for the SigEp alumni volunteer corporation, also won an award at the conference — the Distinguished Alumnus Award. Staff was a Sigma Phi Epsilon member at the University of Texas, and his son attends Tech.
Randy Staff and Beau Jacobson with awards. Photo courtesy of the SigEp Facebook Page
“Mr. Staff has been working with Texas Iota, which is our chapter designation, for a few years; I think like 14 – 15 years if I’m not mistaken,” DeRossi said. “He has seen the chapter at its worst, at its best, and he continues to work with us.”
DeRossi also commented on the recents events in the past year regarding Greek life.
“Under the scrutiny and microscopes that fraternities are under right now, it’s ‘you make one wrong move, and you’re done,'” DeRossi said. “And, that goes to say that we have some pretty strong alums that work with us, and even they can’t say a whole lot if we were caught hazing someone or anything, and that’s what the fraternity world needs to learn. What happened in the past is not what we can do right now or in the future.”
Jacobson said the Zollinger Award also has a roll-off effect.
“I can pick one sophomore to receive a $1000 scholarship for their next year of college,” Jacobson said, “so I am in the process of determining what sophomore I want to give that to, and I will be fair about it. We will figure out as a chapter who to give it to — meet with exec board and various members to choose.”
Jacobson said the fraternity provided him a structure that allowed him to succeed.
“As a freshman in a new member class, they helped me learn things like how to do business interactions by bringing in speakers and faculty, how to dress. Simple things like that that took me from that 18- year-old boy that I was and into the young man I am today.”
About Kaitlin Thogmartin
