Media students mash it up

By Chad Ibbotson

Nice poster: Sara Hamil and Gary Nercessian, both public relations students, pose with the media mash-up poster. They will be helping to sell tickets for the event. Photo by Chad Ibbotson.In a world where many different media are starting to intertwine, it is more important than ever to make contacts outside of your immediate field of study.
That’s why students from all media programs are invited to the first ever Media Mash Up on Wednesday, Oct. 15 from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. in the Shark Tank Pub. Tickets will be sold in locations across the college for $5 and students will be asked which program they belong to when they purchase their ticket.
The executive director of CBC Sports, Scott Moore, will be a guest speaker at the event.
“What I’ll probably talk about is the success of the Olympic games as a multi-platform event. More and more people are demanding availability to watch big events – like the Olympics, like hockey – when they want, where they want and how they want,” Moore said.
Moore said he speaks fairly regularly at colleges and was a guest speaker at Loyalist about 10 years ago. He said he has worked with a number of Loyalist graduates.
“I embrace any opportunity to talk to the next generation of media executives and learn from them,” Moore said.
“I’m not just blowing smoke when I say I tend to learn as much from these things as I’m able to teach. I believe people who are just getting into the industry have as much understanding of where the industry is going because they are consumers of it,” he said.
Prof. Cathy Goddard from the television program was one of the main reasons Moore decided to speak at Loyalist again, as the two are friends.
“The reason we’re having Scott Moore come to speak – one, is timeliness. At the tail end of the Beijing Olympics he’s going to talk about how CBC pushed content for the Olympics and how it was cross-platform,” said Goddard. “He’s also a big proponent of breaking down silos in the workplace so that departments work together.”
The night is designed as a media student mixer. Students across the spectrum of media programs, from public relations to radio broadcasting, can come together in meet in a fun yet professional night.
“Media Mash Up comes from a technological term of the mashing of technologies. A lot of students are on Facebook for instance. They may upload YouTube clips to their Facebook. They may include a podcast and suddenly technologies are becoming more and more intertwined,” said Prof. Kerry Ramsay, co-ordinator of the post-graduate public relations program at Loyalist.
Since media programs represent the largest student population at Loyalist (approximately 21 per cent of the college’s 2807 students or about 589 students, plus support staff and faculty) it is increasingly difficult for the students and teachers to get to know one another.
Ramsay, along with Goddard and Prof. Joe Callahan, co-ordinator of the print journalism program, formed a committee and volunteered to plan a night, which could get media students to mingle.
“It’s great to be able to talk to each other because -- once we get into our professions – very often even if you’re a journalist you’ll be dealing with someone who’s in public relations or advertising or television,” said Ramsay.
Ramsay said the cost of the event is definitely worth it. There will be music provided by a DJ from 91X as well as two live student acts, several trade booths and a light buffet.
“The cost is $5 to get in which is really minimal – it doesn’t even cover the cost of food per student,” Ramsay said. “The value of the night is going to be amazing. Every student will leave with some sort of prize.”
Even in the pre-event stage the mash up is bringing people from different programs together. Students from the public relations program are being enlisted to help promote the event and sell tickets and the logo for the fliers was designed by advertising student Maddi Traer.
Public relations student Sara Hamil will be selling tickets to the mash up.
“It’s going to be a really great opportunity for everyone to meet and mingle,” she said. “Do the meet and greet because we’re going to have to run into each other eventually. We may as well share what we know and get to know each other now.”
“We strongly encourage students to purchase tickets before the night because we have a limited number,” Ramsay said. She said about 200-300 people are expected to attend. As of Wednesday over 100 tickets had been sold.