The Marketing and Communications Department at Kellogg Community College has been awarded nine prestigious Medallion Awards from the National Council for Marketing and Public Relations for work promoting the College during the 2022-23 academic year.
The awards include two first-place Gold Medallion Awards, two second-place Silver Medallion Awards and five third-place Bronze Medallion Awards.
Medallion Award winners were announced Oct. 4 during the NCMPR’s annual District 3 Conference, which this year was held in St. Louis. The NCMPR announced KCC had won awards in the following categories:
- Academic Catalog or Class Schedule (Gold), for a booklet schedule promoting the KCC Lifelong Learning Department’s annual Bruin Youth summer camp offerings.
- Wild Card (Gold), for a “mini notebooks” initiative that involves custom notebook giveaways promoting KCC programming across departments.
- Digital Ad (Silver), for a series of animated “Help People” Google Display ads promoting the KCC Nursing Program, created in conjunction with KCC Marketing student workers Lauren Komdeur and Zoe Wawrzyniak.
- Social Media Post (Silver), for a “Where are you now?” Facebook text post published last October, aimed at increasing alumni engagement.
- Communication Success Story (Bronze), for an outreach campaign designed to promote awareness of a new Paramedic Certificate Program grant for students.
- Digital Ad (Bronze), for a series of Google Display ads targeting guest students including a photo of a student created by former KCC Marketing student worker Bailey Scott.
- Novelty (Bronze), for custom color-changing spoon giveaways KCC produced for this year’s Cereal Festival in downtown Battle Creek.
- Print Advertisement (Bronze), for a series of full-page color “Experience KCC” ads that appeared in the Battle Creek Shopper News in August 2022.
- Social Media Post (Bronze), for a Facebook post published in June linking to a BruIN magazine feature about Physical Science professor Ron Smith, who retired last year after more than 50 years of teaching at KCC.
“Winning awards is always a welcome validation that the work produced by the Marketing and Communications Department is of the highest quality,” Marketing Director Simon Thalmann said. “We produce good work, we produce a lot of it, and we do it consistently.”
The most rewarding aspect is how the projects the department often receives the most recognition for are ones that are true team efforts, Thalmann said, often involving several members of the Marketing and Communications Department as well as others from around the College, including student workers.
The Gold-winning camps schedule was created in close conjunction with the College’s Lifelong Learning Department, for example, and the Gold-winning mini notebooks are generally created in collaboration with the programs, departments and initiative teams who often initiate the design conversation. Multiple award-winning projects this year included input from student workers employed in the department.
“From ideation and strategy to copywriting and design to proofing, printing and distribution, our work often includes every member of the marketing team and often several partners across College programs and departments,” Thalmann said. “These awards are a testament to the collaborative nature of the department and a healthy culture of communication and trust fostered College-wide at KCC.”
KCC’s Marketing and Communications Department provides a variety of in-house strategy development, marketing management, graphic design and print services under the leadership of Eric Greene, vice president for communications and advancement. The marketing team has won a total of 73 Medallion Awards since 2012, as well as 13 prestigious Paragon Awards – national honors bestowed by the NCMPR – over the same time period.
Department employees include Mackenzie Griffith, graphic design process specialist; June Lewis, print and document services staff assistant; Mike Loader, print and document services technician; Cab Rininger, media design manager; Krissy Stolz, marketing and communications specialist; and Simon Thalmann, marketing director. The department also employs part-time student workers as an opportunity for KCC students to learn valuable, on-the-job marketing, communication and design skills.
The NCMPR represents marketing and public relations professionals at community and technical colleges across the United States and Canada. District 3 of the NCMPR includes schools in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Wisconsin and Ontario. Gold, Silver and Bronze Medallion and Paragon honors are awarded annually in a variety of marketing and public relations categories.
For more news about Kellogg Community College, view our latest press releases online at https://daily.kellogg.edu/category/news-releases.