Kickoff event celebrating the first ever Baruch College & Merrill Lynch IPO Challenge, a competition pitting teams of selected students from eight New York City High Schools against each other for up to $100,000 in prizes and start-up money to fund new businesses.

The event is hosted by Baruch President Kathleen Waldron. Speakers include: Jason Wright, Senior V.P. for Communications and Public Affairs at Merrill Lynch; CUNY Chancellor Matthew Goldstein; CUNY Chancellor Joel I. Klein; Eddy Bayardelle, First V.P. of Global Philanthropy and Community Relations at Merrill Lynch; Laima Tazmin, recipient of the first annual Baruch College & Merrill Lynch IPO Challenge Award for Leadership & Innovation; Iris Blanc, founding director for Virtual Enterprises International; and Kevin Albert, head of Global Private Equities at Merrill Lynch.

In attendance are mentors from Merrill Lynch who are assigned to the each of the high school student teams as well as the principals and teams from of each of these schools.

The high schools participating are: Flushing High School, Fordham Leadership Academy for Business and Technology, Fort Hamilton High School, Harry Van Arsdale High School, Herbert H. Lehman High School, High School for International Business and Finance, Port Richmond High School and Walton High School.