CBA Team One of Three Finalists in National Competition

Five hard-working UIC students and their professor are headed to California next week to present an advertising campaign to Honda executives. Sky Advertising Agency was created by 25-students in Professor David Koehler’s Advertising and Promotions class. The five students comprise one of the three teams from around the country who are competing for a $5,000 grand prize.

The team, mostly junior and senior marketing students, worked through the semester to develop a campaign for the Honda Accord Coupe—performing market research, designing advertisements, recruiting sponsors and holding events to promote the car. “Honda’s average customer is 50 years old,” says Koehler. “They are looking to attract a younger audience, and UIC is a great campus for that. We have a wide range of demographics to appeal to.”

The team’s main event attracted over 4,000 people. Their post-event research showed that students had taken notice of the Accord Coupe, and Honda took notice of the team’s success. As one of the three finalists in the competition, the UIC team was awarded $3,000. Now they will compete with the University of Pittsburgh and California Polytechnic State University for the grand prize.

The five agency principals—Millie Frawley, Chrissy Pontarelli, Alex Cantu, Marcel Krawczyk and Tom Osial—will present to Honda executives on December 17. Their all-expense-paid trip includes the opportunity to meet and mingle with top executives at the company’s American headquarters in Torrance, California.

The campaign, which the students began working on in September, enables them to apply skills acquired in previous classes to a real-world situation. They develop their presentation skills, sharpen their teamwork skills and widen their communication capabilities. The program aims to bridge the gap between industry and education through the experiential learning necessary for the students’ professional development. Last year’s student agency presented a campaign for the CIA that was chosen from among 20 other schools and will be launched nationwide in the spring. UIC’s teams have won three out of their last four competitions.

The campaigns are coordinated by EdVenture Partners, an education-marketing agency that designs unique industry-education partnerships at campuses around the United States. EdVenture Partners, in conjunction with the client sponsors, provides each student agency with the resources and guidance necessary to design and implement their marketing campaigns. This is the fourth year UIC has collaborated with EdVenture Partners.