school is killing my education
Schools killing creativity and relativity have always been a topic of interest and curiosity.
I have to say the University of Oregon has a multitude of outstanding programs, classes, professors, clubs, etc. However, the major component missing at the U of O – and in reality the majority of schools – is the element of relativity.
Many of the classes fail to properly prepare us for the post-education world. For example, when I complete my Spanish major next term, I will not have taken a single sole conversation class. Aside from the class I am taking this term; every other U of O Spanish class has been a lecture, mainly consisting of the professor lecturing, essay assignments and tests. I certainly feel confident in my written Spanish; however, my conversational Spanish is nowhere at the same level as the Spanish major lacks this element of language accusation.
Although the Spanish major is literature based, it is just as important to understand the culture, societies and countries that these works and authors originated from. I have a slight advantage as I had the opportunity to study in Mexico – at least when it comes to Mexican authors/works; however, I know I could have a more well-rounded understanding if the cultural/societal element was present as contextual information is just as, if not more important.
As for my advertising/journalism major – in terms of relevancy, this major is more on par as we have classes and programs that teach us post –college skills (our Curiosity for Strategists class and Allen Hall Advertising student run agency, for example). However, we could always benefit from more relevant classes – for example, an open-source class with no theme decided until the first day. All students would brainstorm ideas and the class would choose the ten topics that interested them most – from there, each week would be spent on one of these topics and that would be the class – relevant, collaborative and interesting.
The ad. program could also improve by leaps and bounds if there were required conversation classes. In the communications industry, presenting and selling ideas in addition to having skills to lead intelligent and strategic conversations is vital for success. The SOJC has prepared us to express ourselves in written form and specifically, the ad. major has taught us to think and generate ideas strategically; however, our conversation skills are nowhere near the same level.
cre8con 2008
Great start to cre8con with On Your Feet!
Improvised creativity activities.
Damali Ayo – Crow Clothing – great speaker. Felt like I was watching our Sameunderneath presentation, but either way, she was a fabulous speaker, extremely captivating (hmm, Ryan anyone?!)
Please take not of the copy under Walmart, upper left corner
And then there was Jelly Helm. I’m pretty sure within 30 seconds, the entire audience fell in love with him. He was such a great speaker, down to earth and had extremely relevant points.
- How to give a speech: say what you know to be true
- Advice: Don’t read Chomsky.
- Successful brands in the 21st century: aren’t created by agencies! Created by direct experience because experience doesn’t lie.
Jelly Helm
Megan and I agreed that that basically everything Jelly said in his presentation was everything we have been wanting to say about branding/advertising but haven’t been able to put it into words. And now Jelly is leaving Wieden. And now I’m reevaluating my entire life plan.
All in all, great conference – major kudos to Steve Gehlen for making this happen!
Sidenote:
During lunch, Megan and I found the largest sasquatch behemoth dog I’ve seen:
