Universities Use Video To Sell Coursework
By Dr. Marciene Mattleman
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - It's becoming increasingly common at North American universities to have media teams set up to help faculty members develop course trailers.
Harvard was an early adopter of these short videos attracting students who spend the first week of school "shopping" for courses to take.
The trailers have more intimacy than posters, email advertising and catalogues and are popular at the University of California at Berkeley, Baylor and Brown. Time-lapsing sequences styled after the TV show House of Cards have been used to "sell" a course or a campus.
Since 2014, Toronto's Centennial College has attracted 91,000 views!
The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that there are less optimistic interpretations - trailers generating buzz but not scholarship. While film studies, communications and computer science can present their work in video form, does marketing work for other content?
Still using the medium, Harvard and Baylor now produce official trailers helping faculty become more media savvy and more comfortable with the approach.