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Friday,
April 16, 2004 |
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Journalism
department to launch advertising agency in fall
An
alumnus and former advertising CEO will lead the student-run
advertising/public relations firm when it starts.
By
Julia Mae Jorgensen
In
an effort to market its students to the nation and provide
them with real world experience, the journalism department
announced Thursday it is pursuing plans to launch a student-run
advertising/public relations agency in the fall.
The program would be the first of its kind in the United
States, said Tommy Thomason, department chairman.
“This has been in my master plan for the department
for the past four years,” Thomason said.
The director of the pioneer program is Greg Regian, a
TCU alumnus and former president and CEO of Regian &
Wilson Advertising, once the largest advertising agency
in Fort Worth. Regian made the announcement to a full
classroom during a joint Advertising Club and Public Relations
Student Society of America meeting.
“You’ve got to have the balance of theoretical
and real world experience,” Regian said.
Regian said when he was a student at TCU one of his critiques
was not getting the necessary experience to produce a
résumé.
“I’ve got the opportunity to share with all
of you a part of the real world experience,” he said.
The name of the agency will be Real World Advertising.
It will have four core sponsors during its planning stages:
a real estate company, a shoe retailer, the Fort Worth
Star-Telegram and the Fort Worth Zoo. The program will
use the sponsor’s marketing budgets as the funding
source for the class, Regian said.
“This is a teaching opportunity with real world clients
and real world results,” Thomason said.
Once the program receives complete university approval
for the agency in the coming months, the journalism department
plans to offer it as a class in the fall. The number of
credit hours for the class is yet to be determined.
Thomason said the department is looking at storefront
property to provide a real business setting.
Regian said the genius behind the program is that students
are not creating conceptual ad campaigns, but real advertisements
and complete marketing campaigns. Students will see their
ads, if bought by the client, in the Star-Telegram and
on billboards throughout Fort Worth, Regian said.
Jessica Danford, a junior advertising/public relations
major, said the new program sounds incredible.
“It’s one thing to learn about the principles
of advertising in a classroom and it’s completely
another to do it in a professional setting,” Danford
said. “This will give us a jump on our careers.”
Regian said a student-run advertising agency is “perfect”
for both the journalism department and the university.
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