I’m not sure if you noticed or not, but I’m the new intern at Easter Seals Crossroads writing weekly blog posts for INDATA. I will be a senior at Butler University next year and will graduate with a degree in Integrated Communication (that’s just Butler’s fancy way of saying Public Relations and Advertising). This past week I was out of town competing in the National Student Advertising Competition (NSAC). Our team from Butler University has been working for two semesters on an integrated $100 million campaign for JCPenney. Our team was made of student graphic designers, copywriters, researchers, media planners, creative directors, account executives, public relations practioners and more. Throughout the year, I was the Assistant Account Executive and took care of all the behind-the-scenes details for the campaign. I registered the team, paid the registration fee, ordered materials, shipped documents, fundraised, applied for grants and a handful of other tasks.
To qualify for Nationals, our team, Butler ADrenaline, had to win the regional competition in Detroit in April 2011. We finished first out of 11 teams! We presented our ideas in a 32 page plans book and through a 20 minute presentation to a panel of judges. Last week we traveled to the beautiful city of San Diego for the national competition. Our team finished an astounding fourth place out of about 150 other universities in the country. It was so great to see that our hard work finally paid off!
During the week we also had free time for exploring the city. We went to the world famous San Diego Zoo, Balboa Park, Old Town for dinner (and it was delicious Mexican food!), the Gaslamp district for dinner and drinks, took surfing lessons, visited Seal Beach in La Jolla and wandered around the gorgeous Coronado Island. We stayed on the San Diego Bay and the view from the hotel was breathtaking. After being gone for a week and back to work it sure makes me appreciate that week of bliss!