Last modified: Thursday, February 26, 2009
IU Office of Scholarships wins 'gold' in Annual Advertising Awards Competition
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Feb. 26, 2009
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- The Indiana University Bloomington Office of Scholarships recently won the gold award in two categories of the Higher Education Marketing Report's Annual Admissions Advertising Awards competition.
The two entries that won gold among strong competition were the "You've Earned Your Stripes!" campaign in the Total Marketing Campaign category and the "Scholars Reception" print pieces in the Logo/Letterhead design category. The Office of Scholarships will receive two framed plaques in recognition of the awards.
The "Stripes" campaign was created as a recruitment effort for high school seniors who applied to IU by the November 1 priority date and earned IU's highest level of Automatic Academic Scholarship (IU Excellence for residents and IU Distinction for non-residents). The campaign (including a personalized congratulatory letter, red-and-white striped IU scarf, and coordinating Web site) connected the tradition of stripes at IU and other traditions of excellence, with the academic success of these students.
"What was most exciting about this campaign was the overwhelming response from these outstanding high school seniors. These students have 'earned their stripes' and we look forward to having them join the IU family of scholars this fall," said Sarah Booher, director of scholarships at IU.
In spring 2008, IU hosted its first regional "IU Scholars Reception" to honor and recognize high school seniors who had received IU scholarships. The print pieces for this event included a unique invitation, program, name tag, and thank you card, all of which centered on the word "scholar" and the Arbutus, IU's official flower.
"From the moment these students opened the invitation through the day of the event itself, our goal was to demonstrate that IU honors the achievements of our incoming scholars and is proud to celebrate their academic success," said Stephanie Dowdy-Nava, assistant director of scholarships.
The design had three primary objectives, said Dowdy-Nava: to provide a memorable, unique design that focused on the students as scholars and incorporated an element of IU history; to contribute to the prestigious and celebratory atmosphere of the event; and to encourage invitation recipients to attend the reception and ultimately attend IU.
The Admissions Advertising Awards is the largest educational advertising awards competition in the country.
This year, more than 2,000 entries were received from more than 1,000 colleges, universities and secondary schools from every state and several foreign countries. Judges for the competition consisted of a national panel of admissions' marketers, advertising creative directors, marketing and advertising professionals, and the editorial board of Higher Education Marketing Report.
