By Marc Lewis

 

 

 

Sorry Adland

 

We have a tradition at School of Communication Arts. On the second day of the second week of the first term, I reveal the story of the year to our students.

 

We’ve done this seven times now, to seven intakes.

 

Each intake gets a different story.

At the same time, I give the students a little sound bite to accompany their story.

On hearing the story of their year and the sound bite, the students are challenged to work in teams to come up with a name for their year and produce a video that sells their name.

I always send my favourite names to our network of 850+ mentors, asking them to vote for the winner.

The first intake became known as BUSK. They were followed by LOVECHILD, SPANK, LOVE THY LABOUR, B.A.R.K (Begin a Revolution, Kids) & M.O.S.H (Make Original Shit Happen).

On day two of week two of this new academic year, I told the students about their story. Their theme is ‘Constructed Reality’. The sound bite that I shared with them is ‘We aspire to control the narrative’.

 

I then put the students into eight teams and gave them ten days to come up with a name and a video.

 

I planned to send a shortlist of videos to our mentor network today, asking them to vote for the winning name.

 

And then this happened.

 

 

Matthew, Matt, Laurens and Laura broke the rules, challenged the brief, pushed, played, and provoked. They took control.

 

Sorry adland, I can’t ask you to vote for our name this year. There has been a coup at SCA.

 

I look forward to introducing you to our revolutionary new intake.