[new-here]

Hello everyone ,

Its been a really long time since I got on this site. I hope this is the right forum for this question? Anyways, I need some help choosing my courses for High School based on my career choices (and college).
I had Business (finance) in mind. However, I think advertising would be a good field too. Therefore, in order to pursue this career....what should I study in college?.....I came across Mass Communication, Marketing...
By "advertising" as a career, I mean working in the creative dept. of an advertising company. Is there a separate undergraduate course offered in colleges for people who would like to work in this field?
I am currently a sophomore in High School and I am trying to choose my IB courses next year (and they have to be relevant to what I want to do in college).

[new-here]

bump.

[star_violet]

(Original post by new-here)
Hello everyone ,

Its been a really long time since I got on this site. I hope this is the right forum for this question? Anyways, I need some help choosing my courses for High School based on my career choices (and college).
I had Business (finance) in mind. However, I think advertising would be a good field too. Therefore, in order to pursue this career....what should I study in college?.....I came across Mass Communication, Marketing...
By "advertising" as a career, I mean working in the creative dept. of an advertising company. Is there a separate undergraduate course offered in colleges for people who would like to work in this field?
I am currently a sophomore in High School and I am trying to choose my IB courses next year (and they have to be relevant to what I want to do in college).

If you say you want to work as a "creative" in advertising then typically you would study a creative field such as graphic design. However there are many other roles within advertising agencies, eg. account manager or strategic planner. For this you would need a business degree, typically one in marketing. Hope that helps.

[gabriellerosec]

Yes there are a few. You need to search for Creative Advertising courses. These generally lead to a career as an Art Director or Copywriter at an advertising agency, working with coming up with concepts, visuals, words and ideas for adverts.

I currently study Creative Advertising at The University of Lincoln, which is a fantastic course. There are plenty of great courses ran by different universities to choose from.

Generally to get onto a Creative Advertising degree you do need to have taken an creative subject beforehand, such as Art, Media, Design & Technology etc.

[EmmyLauren]

(Original post by gabriellerosec)
Yes there are a few. You need to search for Creative Advertising courses. These generally lead to a career as an Art Director or Copywriter at an advertising agency, working with coming up with concepts, visuals, words and ideas for adverts.

I currently study Creative Advertising at The University of Lincoln, which is a fantastic course. There are plenty of great courses ran by different universities to choose from.

Generally to get onto a Creative Advertising degree you do need to have taken an creative subject beforehand, such as Art, Media, Design & Technology etc.

Hi, i know you wrote your comment ages ago but i'm currently in AS (just about to begin A2) and i was really looking into Creative Advertising at Lincoln. Do you think you could tell me some more about the course in depth from a more personal view from the prospectus, your experience ect cause i'm finding it really tricky to decide on a course. What's the interview like/portfolio stuff? And do i need to be a great drawer because i did art at GCSE and got a B but i can only do fine art of still life haha....no quick, good sketches. I do Media, Film and Photography at college though for the creative side. I would REALLY appreciate your help, thankyou

[gabriellerosec]

(Original post by EmmyLauren)
Hi, i know you wrote your comment ages ago but i'm currently in AS (just about to begin A2) and i was really looking into Creative Advertising at Lincoln. Do you think you could tell me some more about the course in depth from a more personal view from the prospectus, your experience ect cause i'm finding it really tricky to decide on a course. What's the interview like/portfolio stuff? And do i need to be a great drawer because i did art at GCSE and got a B but i can only do fine art of still life haha....no quick, good sketches. I do Media, Film and Photography at college though for the creative side. I would REALLY appreciate your help, thankyou

Hiya Emmy, I've followed you on twitter with my internet sleuthing skills (kind of creepy but yeah HIYA!) haha. So you can get in touch with me anytime regarding questions, or alternatively you can block me and report me to a trusted adult for being scary.

As for an overall summary of the course I can tell you it is fantastic. I'm one of the vastly declining species of student that can safely say that I love my course, a lot of my friends on different courses say that whilst they love University their lectures, tutorials and seminars aren't something they look forward to attending at 9am after a heavy night drinking every few days, I'm proud to say I do (everyday). You're expected to put in a mind-numbing amount of hours in comparison to your peers and a hell of a lot of work too but you'll have fun doing it and it really won't feel like a chore if it's what you want to do (and anything that you're paying in excess of - for you - £9000 shouldn't feel like a chore.)

As for actual content in first year we had a short photography module - you'll find this easy as you're already doing it - which I thought was a lot of fun and the tutor Jackie is amazing. It's really silly briefs to get you to excersize your creativity whilst learning about camera stuff. For example for one brief we went out and took photos of things that looked like letters in order to create our own alphabet image.

Another module is the Creative Writing one, the tutor Mike is great, you'll basically spend a section of your week listening to stories from him and then he'll set you a brief to do some writing of your own based on what he's been telling you about. It's a wonderful way to practise writing and storytelling in all sorts of forms and you're given a lot of freedom to let your creativity flow.

We also have Mike and another tutor Annie for Culture and Context, where you learn about the history of Advertising and how it's evolved alongside general ways that culture effects Advertising. You get to visit museums and you'll be expected to write a few essays and do some presentations on topics. One essay I chose to write about an iconic image was on the Marlboro Man and the semiotics and meanings that some of the images used in that campaign had, I personally got a lot of satisfaction writing about it.

There's an Art module too, this one is a bit crazy, I certainly felt like it pushed me. It involves some really random stuff, which is often taxing, like creating an 800 frame animation on the history of the universe using only abstract symbols. We also made cakes based on given characters, slightly dangerous considering some of my classmates decided to use entire garlic bulbs and fish paste, but a lot of fun.

Then there's the Creative Advertising part itself; Justin, who is the head of year, sets you some really varying briefs. Including short films, model making, spreading lies, doing monologues as a biscuit, a "Get 100,000 Hits on Youtube" brief and a lot more. Whilst this may not directly be advertising, it's all great ways to really change the way you make things, come up with ideas and generally look at the world.

In second year, once your mind has been all creatively jumbled you begin to actually make adverts, and in third year you create your book and form partnerships, ready to be released into the big bad world.

Ok so I realise I've kind of written an essay on it all but yeah that should give you a more personal and understandable idea of what the course content is like. As for other stuff I went on a trip to New York this year to visit some lovely agencies over there, and I'm now the head of social events for the courses Creative Advertising society (so lots of BBQ's and nights out planned). Which brings me on nicely to the social side of the course, it's very different to most undergraduate courses in that we spend way too much time together, a lot of my friends who aren't on the course at uni barely speak to their course mates, but we really don't have a choice haha. We're a very tight knit course, everyone knows everyone and we're all friends, which is nice. Next year I'm living in a house with all people from my course, something that none of my flatmates have, I also went on a cheeky beach holiday with course mates earlier this summer too.

To answer your interview question, it's really laid back, the tutors just want to get to know you, it's quite refreshing compared to some of the other Creative Advertising interviews I went to, which were kind of terrifying. I guess they want you to equally get a feel for the place and make sure it's right for you. Be ready to chat about anything and just relax cos it's lovely haha, my best friend told me he spent the entire interview talking about The Hills, but I guess he showed passion so it's all good! For your portfolio just bring along anything that shows your creativity, pick your favourite media, film and photography coursework, the bits that you think really demonstrate your abilities to make cool stuff. Alongside this anything that you've made or been a part of really, you could show a video you made, doodles and drawings, a cake you baked, photos of an epic party you planned, give them a link to your blog, show the blueprints to your plans for your dream house, sing them an acoustic song about your cat, or your zombie apocalypse escape plan you've written just in case. Honestly they're just looking for examples of your creativity alongside evidence that you're hardworking and the right kind of person for the course, let your personality shine. You don't need to be an excellent artist, just an excellent ideas person, so don't worry about that too much, I use a light box to trace photos I've printed for pictures I want to make.

All in all it's an incredibly hard, time consuming, dedication needing, energy sucking, crazy course if you want to do well. You'll probably miss out on quite a lot of sleep and even more tv but it's also extremely rewarding and a hell of a lot of fun. And whilst I mightn't have has as many lie ins and I'd like and I might have nearly gone insane (I head butted my desk once) if I could go back and pick any other course I wouldn't. It's the only course I can think of that most of the students just want to get the summer holidays over and done with after a few weeks so they can go back and be driven insane again.

Anyways I've spent way longer than intended writing this but hopefully I've given you a more honest insight to what the course is like, the only other thing I'd say is try and go to as many open days as you can, and definitely come to Lincoln, it'll help make sure your decision is the right one!

[EmmyLauren]

(Original post by gabriellerosec)
Hiya Emmy, I've followed you on twitter with my internet sleuthing skills (kind of creepy but yeah HIYA!) haha. So you can get in touch with me anytime regarding questions, or alternatively you can block me and report me to a trusted adult for being scary.

As for an overall summary of the course I can tell you it is fantastic. I'm one of the vastly declining species of student that can safely say that I love my course, a lot of my friends on different courses say that whilst they love University their lectures, tutorials and seminars aren't something they look forward to attending at 9am after a heavy night drinking every few days, I'm proud to say I do (everyday). You're expected to put in a mind-numbing amount of hours in comparison to your peers and a hell of a lot of work too but you'll have fun doing it and it really won't feel like a chore if it's what you want to do (and anything that you're paying in excess of - for you - £9000 shouldn't feel like a chore.).................

Hi Gabrielle, thankyou so much for that, I just read all of it in awe because the course sounds fantastic!
You have been incredibly helpful and put me at ease-i'm such a worrier honestly. I literally can't thank you enough, you're fab! I'm going to the september open day and cannot wait to look around, thanks again, Emmy

P.S No worries about the Twitter thing

[gabriellerosec]

(Original post by EmmyLauren)
Hi Gabrielle, thankyou so much for that, I just read all of it in awe because the course sounds fantastic!
You have been incredibly helpful and put me at ease-i'm such a worrier honestly. I literally can't thank you enough, you're fab! I'm going to the september open day and cannot wait to look around, thanks again, Emmy

P.S No worries about the Twitter thing

No problem, maybe I'll see ya in September then! Good luck!