During the Fall 2018 semester, our ATION team partnered with Connecticut Public with the task of developing a way to stimulate a digital culture that would engage and interest college students.
Connecticut Public provides informational, educational, and inspirational content to the people of Connecticut. Their vision is to connect Connecticut citizens through storytelling and journalism that shares what matters most in the community.

Elizabeth Messina, Vice President of Media Innovation, informed us of Connecticut Public’s goals of appealing to a younger demographic and continuing their long history of loyal viewers. Many are familiar with Connecticut Public’s broadcast channels (CPTV, CPTV Spirit), NPR, and PBS; however, most of the individuals who engage with their content are not within the target market of 17 to 23-year-olds.

After much discussion, the team decided that creating a video interview resource would best suit Connecticut Public’s needs. By interviewing Connecticut college students about their interests and content preferences, the team was able to draw up trending themes that Connecticut Public could use to develop content to engage 17 to 23-year-olds, foster a digital culture, and develop lasting relationships with a new audience.

Initially, our team proposed conducting a survey to help us narrow in on specific content to cover during the interviews when we met with our client on October 5th at Connecticut Public’s headquarters in Hartford, CT.

However, due to us being unable to have our survey expedited by the IRB (an institutional review board, task with evaluating the implementations and ethics in conducted research), the survey could not be conducted. By October 18th, the team adapted to the obstacle and decided to jump forward with interviews within our network sphere. This included having two of our team members, Corlis Fraga and Ben Chason, CITI (Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative) certified to conduct interviews.

We wanted the interviews to be insightful and spent great care in developing interview questions that would be useful for the client’s needs. After gaining client critiques, the team was able to establish suitable questions for interview purposes (ex: What do you find you need more of in your life since being at University, and do you think that having a lack of this is a problem for most college students?).

Two film dates (November 2nd and 9th) and 22 students later, enough footage was accumulated to develop a visual research archive for the client. Title cards and motion graphics were developed to introduce speaking students and the proposed questions, and transcripts were constructed to aid the client in their pursuit of isolating key themes of interest for 17 to 23-year-olds.

 

By December 6th, the interviews were delivered to the client, along with additional assets (transcripts, raw footage…etc.) which included a written document detailing the team’s perspective on what Connecticut Public could develop content wise based off the interview responses. Due to the team’s age and status as college students, our insight is meant to benefit the project and its objectives.

 

Throughout the semester the team remained dynamic in our approach to the project. There were times of in-person collaboration (ex: ideation, major decisions, interview process, presentation construction…etc.) as well as times where the skills of individual team members were utilized to divide and tackle the project from multiple sides.

 

The team consisted of:

Corlis Fraga – Project Manager/3D Animation/Project Coordinator

Corlis was primarily responsible for writing/organizational aspects and direct communication with the client. She continuously updated the team, formatted presentations, and ensured that deadlines were kept in mind throughout the semester. She was also CITI certified and asked interviewee’s questions during the film dates.

James Brockett – Project Manager/Motion Graphics/Film

James (Jimmy) was instrumental in the technical aspect of filming the interviews and operating equipment. He also compiled the audio and video footage that would be passed over to Malik for editing and created motion graphic templates to introduce the interviewed students in the final videos.

Ben Chason – Digital Business Strategies/Film

Ben was the second team member to be CITI certified and was the primary survey developer during the time when the team was attempting to carry out the construction and distribution of a Qualtrics survey to generate better interview questions. He also assisted in the technical aspect of the interview process.

Kaity Seman – 3D Animation/Motion Graphics

Kaity actively assured deliverables and assets developed over the course were polished and presentation worthy. She curated motion graphics seen in the polished interviews and was a great coordinator in reaching out to other students to get them to participate in the interviews.

Chris Glenn – Web Design/Film

Chris assisted in various aspect of the project, including presentation formatting and development, interviewing, and the curation of deliverables for both the client and for Student Agency purposes. He also shot behind-the-scenes photos and videos.

Malik Harris – Motion Graphics/Film

Malik was the ‘Jack of all Trades’ member and assisted throughout the project on both large and small tasks. Primarily, he edited all the footage and spliced the interviews together in the format submitted to our client.

 

Challenges of the project included: team member sickness, time management, IRB exemption rejection, gaining interview volunteers, and our perception of how much time we had for what we wanted to complete. However, through our member’s determination and the ability to remain flexible, we were able to rise past the challenges that our client pointed out were very “real-world” obstacles. Upon reflection, finding better ways to communicate when not in-person (other that using Slack and email) is a task that we all must keep in mind for future reference.

Overall, the team worked well in meeting the end goal and was given positive feedback from the client. It is with hope that the resource generated will serve Connecticut Public well as they attempt to inspire greater interest from college students.

Here’s a sample of the work we produced: