Week 4 turned the students’ attention to the challenges facing Team Outreach, including promotion and advertising, recruitment and coordination, scheduling and notifications, and integration with FSU’s innovation celebration – https://innovation.fsu.edu/events/celebration/. Two guest speakers, Kate Mullen and Alvaro Gabaldon, media specialists from the College of Communication and Information, shared their insights into the challenges of marketing, hype, and making a video go viral!
The students brainstormed many different options in small groups, including approaches to outreach such as flyers, teaser trailers, tabling on the green during class, working with different student groups and organizations, and using puppies to raise awareness. We talked about how, for the students, “you are your target market,” and explored what would make them want to be a part of this event. We also discussed how the different options for Team Outreach would need to integrate with the tasks of Team Video, Team Engineering, and Team Storytelling. Finally, the students were excited this week to learn that FSU President Thrasher was formally on board with this project, and ready to stand at the center of our flash mob! Based on the President’s availability during FSU’s Innovation Celebration, our official date and time for our #torchthegreen #thrashmob was officially set for Thursday, April 6 at 2:00pm.