While no one was looking, the university's advertisers built "a new Ball State." It looks exactly like the Ball State Museum of Art that's been around for decades, but according to recent commercials featuring President Jo Ann Gora - and no one else - it's "a new Ball State."
But at best, the university in the commercials is "a misrepresented Ball State." Luckily, Ball State only spent $190,000 of its tight budget to make this mistake.
During the Olympics, the university launched an interim advertising campaign - in addition to the "cutting-edge cool" billboards - that aims to convince parents of potential students that Ball State excels.
But any Ball State advertisement that does not feature students as the primary focus is not a true indication of this university's strongest aspects.
Tom Taylor, vice president for Enrollment, Marketing and Communications, said these ads were created to appeal only to the parents of high school students.
Unfortunately, it's not the parents who will be filling out applications.
And it'd be a surprise if many high schoolers are convinced to apply to Ball State as a result of these somber ads. They focus predominantly on Gora's unenthusiastic face - in contrast to her overly animated hands - and take place only within the Art Museum - on a staircase most Ball State students haven't touched. The Art Museum isn't Ball State - the Atrium is, Frog Baby is and students are.
Close-up shots of a university president wandering through the darkened Art Museum aren't likely to impress the typical Internet-generation high school student - or even his parents. The Emmy-winning telecommunications department, which is full of students eager for new projects and even makes an appearance in one of the ads, could've made a professional-quality, upbeat commercial that appeals to multiple generations - but the university chose not to take advantage of that resource.
In fact, the TCOM department's Emmys, the several top-ten academic programs, titles of distinction in national magazines and even the "cutting-edge" wireless system on campus are not mentioned in the ads.
The unexciting, dark, stagnant university represented in these ads is not the university more than 20,000 excited, interesting, motivated Cardinals have chosen to attend. For students of Ball State and for those who want to be, this is an unfair misrepresentation of the university.
Any more ineffective interim ad campaigns like this could seriously undermine the university's goal - unless that goal is to remove students entirely from the university's image.
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