This week the University of Bedfordshire hosted the annual Bedfordshire, Northamptonshire and Milton Keynes UCAS Exhibition. The event was held over two days at our Bedford campus and welcomed thousands of students on campus to find out more about the different options available to them in the future.
It was a great two days. The sun was shining (ok that might be an understatement - it was very hot!) and there was a great atmosphere on campus. As well as representatives from over 150 higher education institutions, there were representatives from the Army, gap year organisations, and information on apprenticeships.
I was helping out on the University of Bedfordshire stand, talking to students about what they want to do after college and giving them more information on the various courses we offer, the benefits of undertaking a year in industry, and how we can offer them more than a great degree. It was a non-stop couple of days but it was a great opportunity to speak to students, staff from local schools and colleges, and staff from other higher education institutions.
The event also made the ITV news so if you weren't able to attend the event take a look at the news story here. I make a small cameo (ah!).
I'm also helping out at another UCAS exhibition tomorrow at the University of East London (UEL) where I'll have another opportunity to talk to students about the different opportunities available at the University of Bedfordshire! I'm hoping for an air conditioned room!
The torrential downpours are here, wind is getting up, and
every three days the sun is out, yes the Great British Summer is finally here.
So summer in HE, students have done their exams, the last artworks in the
degree show taken off the wall, and you can get served in the on campus Costa
in under three minutes. For support staff though, it is our busiest time as we
prepare for the beast that is clearing.
Each year the emphasis on clearing across the sector varies, from important to
really important, and this year it is definitely the latter. In part this is
due to the changing applicant behaviour, we’ve seen trends during recent cycles
of applicants making decisions later and later, putting more pressure on the
clearing process.
This year we are more ready than ever. Although technically an applicant can’t
apply for a course with a university until the official start of clearing on 8
July, we have already launched our Clearing 2017 website. There are a few
changes this year too, the first being the main call to action. As we are a
month early, we are asking students to call and leave details with us, or
complete a request a call back form, enabling us to compile an almost VIP list
of interested applicants. This gives us the opportunity to keep those really
keen, interested and warm.
A second notable change is the way we display our student success stories.
Often day-to-day the successes of our graduates can go unnoticed when absorbed in your own departments work. We can often take for granted their achievements, and this year we are going all out in shouting about them. The beautiful thing about these stories is that the successes are all from students who attended the University of Bedfordshire through clearing.
I think that the stigma of gaining a place at university through clearing being
seen as a bad thing is disappearing, and reading these stories you’d see that
from international Rugby star Maggie Alphonisi, to ITV news reader Becky Jago, you
are just as likely to succeed and get the career you’ve always wanted, even if
it all started with the clearing hotline.
To complement our early kick off to clearing, we have an
array of digital ads running and inventory across key students sites, and from
August you can also look out for ad in a cinema near you. The importance of
this information, well as an extra who didn’t end up on the cutting room floor,
the back of head gets into at least two shots.
You can register your interest in a course or just take a
look at the University of Bedfordshire Clearing 2017 site at www.beds.ac.uk/clearing.
Not for some cheeky
straight to web piece; not even for the small screen. This was full widescreen,
cinematic, IMAX threatening celluloid. Or broadcast quality Betamax or
something.
For one afternoon, I was a Business School lecturer. I know
nothing about Business but wasn’t hurled off the set, so my ‘acting’ – by
definition - was a storming success. I was pleased to get the gig, too. This
was a chance to leave the surveys and spreadsheets behind and wave my arms
around while warbling and waffling about ‘what an entrepreneur is’ and what
SWOT stands for (you learn something new every day folks <ahem>).
My evident success stands in contrasts to my screen cv leading
up to that point:
man crossing road in unreleased film which
certainly involved my old flat mate, Ched, and possibly one of the Coppolas (but
not FF or S)
one of a three bother team on Bill Oddie’s History Hunt which, thankfully, hasn’t
surfaced on the internet (I’ve looked so you don’t have to)
man on bike in indie film ‘playing the
festivals’ (it’s called The Same Circles and is very good)
'Me crossing road' footage from first film mentioned above
The theatre is not my first love.
My two stage appearances were forgettable and came more
years ago than I care to imagine
Police detective with designs on the school
caretaker in a Slip End Lower class-written musical theatre production about a
vampire, who rather dominated proceedings with some outrageous overacting;
‘Old Man’ in Upper School production of Brecht’s The Good Person of Szechwan. Or ‘Good Woman’ as it was. My painfully boyish looks and mountains of talc alienated the bejesus out of an audience of tense, bored parents wondering why the hell they weren’t watching Gilbert and Sullivan.
Village ways
Acting as a Business lecturer allowed me to step out of the
day to day while keeping both feet in it. There was a nightmarish quality in
apparently holding an audience in the palm of my hand, telling them that “in
order to run your own business, you need to start a business”. Over and over
again. So many times, in fact, that I started wondering if I hadn’t unearthed
some hidden wisdom and shouldn’t nip off somewhere and write a self-help book.
I hope and assume our real Business lecturers do a better
job.
On set with Clearhead
Was being on a film set what I expected?
No. Though we were cued in with the word ‘ACTION!’ Plus, I
learned that ‘kino’ is not only French for cinema, but also one of those big
‘sun bed on a tripod’ type lights and exchanged some terrific cross-generation ‘bants’ with my joint
lead, Harry, who as an acting student, looked more comfortable than I did about
our fictitious student/teacher relationship. Presumably, these exchanges will
make the outtake reel.
I was impressed, too, with the assured organisation and
management of the process– kudos both to our Marketing team and Clearhead.
Of course, my secret hope is that I’ll get picked up, not by
the CMA, but by David Puttnam or someone. I’m not a betting man, but reckon on
a 40% chance of being on the arty channels within the year. Two at a push.
Anyone in the business note; I will not do reality, soaps or shopping channels.
Perhaps next year, when I’ve moved into BAFTA contention, you too could be in
our cinema ads. Get in touch with the Marketing team; we’d love to hear from
you.
That applies to a guest spot writing on this blog too – if
you want to join our illustrious writers and have something to say about
Marketing and Communications at the University of Bedfordshire, let us know by clicking here. Otherwise, please favour us with a comment below, in the comments box. We'd love to hear from you.
This was the first time I had been able to attend these
awards and I wasn’t sure what to expect. Luckily I was privy to who the winners
were beforehand and was able to prepare in advance (Comms team perk!)
Twitter on a smartphone has a lovely function where you can
save draft tweets – this has saved my bacon on a number of occasions when I
have been live-tweeting.
Armed with the trusty #VCSEA17 hashtag, I wrote a tweet for
each winner and saved it as a draft, ready to slot in a photo and send
out when the time came. I also took a bit of time to find out if the winners
had Twitter accounts that I could use while tweeting. Working at Bedfordshire has taught me many things, but when it comes to live
tweeting, preparation is everything!
The hard work paid off when I got back to the office the next day and
realised that the Twitter activity as a result of my tweeting had earned us 14,000 impressions
in just one day!
Once the awards got underway, it was fantastic to see the
reaction of the winners as they went up to collect their awards. One highlight
was Customer Services Advisor Arsalan Sheikh who jumped for joy when his name
was called out (no jokes, he actually did!)
Another highlight for me was that I was aware that PhD student
Jolel Miah, who I know well, had won the Deputy Lieutenant Community Engagement
Award. He of course didn’t know this, and keeping it quiet beforehand was a
challenge, but the look on his face when he realised he had won was priceless! I’d like to say a huge congratulations to all the winners of this
year’s awards. You can see the full list of winners here.
Whilst a large element of my role can be desk bound - crunching numbers, planning campaigns, writing evaluations, and putting my organisation hat on to drive initiatives forward, one of the bits of my role that I happen to love the most are the chances to be 'creative'. So it's no surprise to read that this week was Prospectus pitch week. Hurrah!
Searching for the perfect agency to partner with.
We've been running a tender to appoint a creative agency to work alongside us on the latest publications for 2019 (2019 already, you say!). So after getting through all the paperwork, questionnaires, budgets and admin, we're at the bit I love best - the creative presentations. It's great to meet different agencies, breathe new life into our work, and ensure we're future proofing our designs, our brand and our proposition to drive recruitment for the coming years (so no pressure then?).
It's always a crammed packed day of back-to-back presentations - but it definitely gets the creative juices flowing across the team. Colleagues from the Recruitment team, and International office joined us, to ensure we had key stakeholder views taken into account, and it made for a fun day for everyone (or at least I hope). We're still deliberating over which agency to work with, and so after we've totaled all the scores I'm sure we'll be able to share with you who we've selected, and some exclusive sneak peaks as to how the visuals could be developing for our future recruitment campaigns. Stay tuned!
Can you ever be too organised?
As the chair of the panel, it's my job to lead the day, keep us on time, and to drive the questioning to ensure we get all of the information we need from each of the agencies to make a good, informed decision. (This is where my organisational hat comes into play again). After all, it's not just a pretty design and nice prospectus cover that we're looking for. A key part of producing the prospectus is all about the processes and structures in place (boring! I hear you say). Ok, so perhaps not the most exciting part of the pitches, but for me, whose produced more than 20 Bedfordshire prospectuses I know a thing or two about the logistical nightmare that can be the prospectus, and if you don't have the right people, processes and infrastructure in place to deliver your publication the whole thing can be absolute torture to deliver. Don't get me wrong, creative is definitely important, but my key driver is making sure we have a company who can deliver on the creative - there's nothing worse than having high hopes for your publication, and half way in, finding out the end result is far from your grasp.
The team (left to right: Sara, Beverley, Kylie and Sarah).
In other news, we've sadly said farewell to Kylie, our Marketing Officer this week. She's left the team this week for pastures new - and is relocating back up north to Newcastle University. We're all really sad to see her go, after three years as part of the team. For those of you who have worked with Kylie, I'm sure you'll agree she's been an instrumental colleague in running our open day campaigns. We wish her all the best, and am sure we'll still see her round on the university circuit in the not too distant future.
But to cheer us all up, and stop us feeling all sorry for ourselves as our marketing team of three has dwindled to a team of just two, we were absolutely delighted to find out just now, that we've been short-listed for not one, but two, Heist awards - for Best Undergraduate Student Recruitment Initiative, and Best Marketing Team of the Year! Now Heist had been keeping us on our toes, and fully in suspense as to when the big reveal would be, and it certainly didn't disappoint. It's been some much needed excitement in the office as we can reflect on our achievements, and celebrate our successes - small we may be, but mighty and effective we are! Usually, we've just entered submissions for our work, but this year I decided this was the year to celebrate us as a team - and boy am I surprised to see we've been short-listed. To have been short-listed for team of the year is a massive coup, and a particular career high for me on a personal note. For our regular readers, you'll often see me banging on about awards, and how much we love them - but it's a big boost for the team, and a lovely end to the week!
Absolutely thrilled to see we've been shortlisted for 2 @heistawards. The @uniofbeds team are celebrating in the office as we speak 😜😬
It wasn’t just politicians who were taken by surprise by the
Prime Minister’s decision to hold a General Election on 8 June but also university Communication teams.
While the various political parties ran around writing
manifesto’s, usually years in the drafting in a matter of weeks, Communication
teams had to make quick decisions around priorities.
Manifesto’s were issued by our sector organisations
including Universities
UK and Million
Plus all with hugely important priorities including ensuring funding for
research, bringing back maintenance grants and getting a good post-Brexit
settlement for universities.
At Bedfordshire we’ve been playing our part by looking at
how to mobilise the student vote. The first step is getting students to
register to vote, then it’s getting them to use that vote.
For me going to university was a time of protest and
campaigning and it was when I was at my most political.
A student of the 80s I went on rent strike, boycotted banks
that refused to condemn the apartheid, and went to concerts that wanted to
‘Free Nelson Mandela’. Even my first date with by future husband was on an
anti-National Front march.
But times have changed and today many students are fed up
with politics and disillusioned with our voting system.
They feel marginalised and don’t see voting as a driver for
change, so they don’t vote. But as they don’t vote, they are ignored by
politicians which leads to their views being ignore; it’s a vicious circle.
Why is a problem for university communication teams? Well part
of our role as a university is to ensure we are preparing our students to take
their place in the world as informed and engaged citizens.
While our Students’ Union
have been sending out emails to encourage voter registration we have being
using social media and our digital screens to ensure our students know the
deadline (it’s the 22 May if you’re interested) and realise how easy it is to register to vote.
Also because the election falls right in the middle of exams
and students might not know where they’ll be; we’re giving them information on
applying for a postal vote.
We are also hosting a Hustings with Uprising a UK-wide youth leadership development
organisation at our Luton Campus. The local General Election candidates for
Luton South will be there and it will be an opportunity for our students
to cross-examine the candidates and share their hopes and aspirations for the
future.
Press wise it’s a crowded marketplace for getting the
University in the press around this subject; but fortunately we do have a Vice
Chancellor who’s passionate about politics and youth participation. We managed
to place an article
in our leading sector magazine Times Higher Education on the importance of
encouraging students to vote and have secured a blog in a student facing
publication around youth participation.
All in all it’s a busy time and it’s work we hadn’t planned
for. But the chances are there may not be another General Election for five
years and giving students a voice is something we all believe in.
"I was at a school 6th form recently,talking to university
applicants. When I could understand what on earth they were talking about, it was quite an eye opener. Perhaps the most striking statement was
along the lines of
All universities are the same. All of them. Yours; everybody.
From what I’ve seen of Hertfordshire and Oxford? The
same
WOW! If in any way representative of a wider view, this cockeyed opinion would delight Herts and give the Dreaming Spires a rude awakening, presumably
with the Dons and other hallowed academic types wondering whether 'perhaps they
should take this “marketing” thing seriously after all'. I suspect, however,
that maybe, just maybe, there was a
certain level of mischief and or disingenuous-ness at large when those words
were oh-so-casually thrown asunder. Some smart aleckery designed to baffle the
man from the local uni.
We’re all older and wiser
That's right. We are all older and wiser than year 12s and year 13s. We can
prove it, too, what with our life experiences, musical tastes and the ownership of
houses and licences (e.g. driving, marriage, television). Yeah, I know, right? We should, however,
give the kids a bit of respect. The Kids, as Pete Townsend
pointed out, are ‘alright’, after all, even if they speak in tongues, can’t/won’t
concentrate, call good things ‘sick’ (possibly? They used to…….) and don’t sit
down with cutlery to eat their ruddy dinner.
Meanwhile, back in MARC, one of Bob C’s favourite analogies
concerns vanilla ice cream. Bob Cozens, as most readers will know, is our
Director whose use of vanilla ice cream is because of its inherent dullness and
– more importantly – ‘sameness’ from one dreary block to another. To many,
vanilla ice cream is something trapped and unloved in other people’s freezers’
ice monsters. A redundant carton passed over for the more exotic Viennetta or
Cornetto. Or even a Mivvi.
Off colour vanilla ice cream
This analogy doesn’t entirely work for me. I like vanilla ice
cream, along with marrows, mild cheese, cottage cheese, suet puddings and other
comestibles which are a bit ‘retro’ and don’t taste of anything. If I want to
talk about university courses presenting an identikit of each other and the same
brain-freezing prospect from one institution to another, I’d be inclined to
talk about fudge, treacle or brown food in ‘piles’, ‘morasses’ or ‘messes’.
Get to the point. Is there a point?
Food aside, there is a point. A real point. University courses
have two price tags. One differentiates (entry requirements), the other doesn’t
(the near universal £9,000 price tag). If we put entry requirements to one side
(a big ‘if’ I grant you), when applicants look at similarly packaged courses at
different institutions, they’re not going to choose generic stodge over shiny bells
and whistles on courses our marketing chums would suggest offer USPs (i.e. ‘good
bits’).
And thinking back to those with lower UCAS points; in an
increasingly competitive market place even those with lowest expectations have a
wide choice before and during Clearing.
When given a once in a lifetime shot at the world’s most
extensive pizza menu, who exactly, will turn round and say “You know what, I’d kill
for a Margherita”. I’ve been Marcoms’ Social Secretary (Lunchtimes) for over a
year now, and no one’s ever chosen Margerita*. Not EVEN when it boasts hand
torn organic Buffalo Mozarella. A Margherita is a Margherita is a Margherita.
Whaoh there! My arteries are literally dying of boredom
And guess what; year 13 and year 12 students GET IT. Course pages and prospectuses
are furiously scanned and course and uni choices made by irrational minds
subject to the forces of behavioural economics and whatever socio-emotional
forces rage in the adolescent system. Minds which profess to no being able to
differentiate between Herts and Oxford; minds which will make irrational
choices.
Please; get to the point.
With all this irrationality, it’s harder to make and convey
any sense, so when you’re writing NCPs and copy for the web, remember
your audience (think more BTEC or A levels than Jedis, grandmasters, masterminds, laureates or gurus). Be succinct and make every word count. Do you need, and will confused school leavers go ape for acronyms, impenetrable language, state of the art cliches and waffle? I can
get away with it here; I’m not trying to sell anything.
Anyway?
Anyway, I’m off to Luton's premier jazz club this evening, then off work tomorrow and Monday. At the weekend,
the Hatters conclude their weird up and down season. I dreamed that Nathan Jones
(Luton Town’s manager) went absolute ape last night and ran down the pitch, in
a tiny fury at a comical but ultimately painless defensive error. Before then,
I’m off to hunt down the new Magnus Mills book, then go and see Wire, which I’m
extremely excited about. They’re from Watford, are very old, a bit 'arty' and sound (sounded)
like this:
See you nodding your head, nursing a pint, towards the back but not so far back that you have to squint to make anything out.
Adios!
*Admittedly, our Marcoms lunches do not represent a
representative sample of the whole world and everyone in it, and other factors
come into play when applicants make their choice of where to apply and where,
ultimately to study.
This Blog is written by the central Marketing team at the University of Bedfordshire. We hope to share some of our achievements and exciting projects that we've been working on in our busy world of publications, photoshoots, and campaign planning, with some good old creativity thrown in there for good measure. We also hope to give you a taster into what we get up to in and around the University.
It was a great two days. The sun was shining (ok that might be an understatement - it was very hot!) and there was a great atmosphere on campus. As well as representatives from over 150 higher education institutions, there were representatives from the Army, gap year organisations, and information on apprenticeships. 
Posts
