Two Gold and One Bronze Awards in Chinese University Students’ Advertising Academy Award

A mock-up attempt in real campaigns is a precious experience for students who would like to work in the industry. Chinese University Students’ Advertising Academy Award (“AAA” hereafter) is one of these occasions that provides opportunities for students to reach out to real-life cases.

The award ceremony of Competition for the 2021 Spring Term was held online on August 22. Students from Public Relations and Advertisng Programme of UIC won more than 20 awards, including a Gold Award for Advertising Copy, a Gold Award for Short Video, a Bronze Award for Marketing Planning, and several Excellent Awards and Finalists. More than 70 PRA students won awards this year, setting a record.

The poster of the AAA Ceremony

Founded in 1999, AAA is sponsored by Chinese Advertising Association. This competition has always attracted college students all over China to create advertising works for well-known domestic and international brands. Over the years, the Competition has reached 2578 departments of more than 1240 universities. More than 1.5 million teachers and students participate in the Competition every year, which has submitted more than 400000 creative works so far.

The poster of AAA Competition for the 2021 Spring Term

Yi TAO, a year-4 PRA student, won the Gold award for Advertising Copy for Blispring, a toothpaste brand. She also won the Finalist for Advertising Copy for Rio Cocktail. After the ceremony, Tao shared her creation experience. “Copywriting is not the same as marketing planning, which requires group cooperation or a lot of time. It is more like a process of ‘fighting alone’. Most of the time has been spent in gaining insight of products, understanding target consumers, and accumulating materials. They are preparing for the moment of inspiration. If you grasp the essence of it, you may create a good copy,” she said. Tao also thanked her supervisor, Dr. Richard XU, for his guidance and encouragement.

YI TAO’s award-winning copy for Blispring

Yi TAO, Gold Award winner

A team of PRA students Lingxu CHEN, Haitong LIN, Yiyao REN, Yixuan ZHANG and Chang CHEN won another Gold Award for their short video for the brand Sleepy Tea. Their video utilizes Kong Fu elements creatively to visualise benefits of the products. After winning the award, they said: “This is the first time to attend this competition. We just wanted to give it a try. When filmed, we made many attempts that we never tried before, so we are really lucky and grateful to have such a honor.” They also thank the organizer for providing this opportunity, and help from teachers and friends.

Award-winning work for Sleepy Tea

Gold Award winners, Lingxu Chen, Haitong Lin, Yiyao Ren, Yixuan Zhang and Chang Chen (top left to bottom right)

Another team of PRA students, Jiani Li, Jiachen Dong, Ao Li, Yuan Li and Hao Duan won a Bronze Award for their marketing campaign plan with a big idea “Walking With You” for Little Quike. They also found that it is a good chance to demonstrate their works, and appreciate everyone who helps them in preparation. “We are also grateful to ourselves. We brainstormed by the side of library windows, discussed intensively despite being attacked by mosquitoes on the sixth floor of T8, designed layouts at CC and T4 discussion rooms, stayed up late in study rooms of dorms. We even discussed on the path, in the sports park and the canteen at V23. The moment of award winning is happy and exciting,” said the team. They also talked about the importance of persistent efforts to make better works in future studies.

Award-winning work "Walking with You"

Bronze Award winners, Jiani LI, Jiachen DONG, Ao LI, Yuan LI and Hao DUAN (top left to bottom right)

Besides these awards, 60 PRA students won awards Excellence Awards and Finalist Awards. Dr. Xiaying (Richard) XU, Dr. Renata Paulina WOJTCZAK and Ms. Shuang (Katherine) HAO have been awarded “Excellent Supervisors” by the organiser.

Gardener Won a Silver Award in College Students’ Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition

China International “Internet+” College Students' Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition-Guangdong Sub Competition Final (hereinafter “Provincial Final”) was held at Guangzhou University on August 11. Three projects from UIC made it to Provincial Final.

Zhuo CHEN, Ruilu HU and Xueyan CAO, three PRA graduates participated as a team Gardener. Under guidance of Dr. Hongzhou LU, Director of UIC Innovation Center, this team won a Silver Award. It is UIC’s best performance in history of this Competition.

PRA graduate Zhuo CHEN, the team’s leader, presented the proposal in the competition

UIC Team with PRA students Won a Second Prize in 2021 Global Open Data Application Innovation Competition

An interdisciplinary team of Yinong FU and Yangziqin LI, two PRA graduates, and Jie ZHENG and Xingjian XU, CCM graduates, stood out among more 1000 teams in 2021 Global Open Data Application Innovation Competition. Their work won a Second Prize of "Hengqin Special Race Track" among more than 400 works.

Yinong FU (left) and Jie ZHENG (right) received the trophy on behalf of the team

Their research project “Analysis and Solutions Based on Hengqin Chimelong and Other Tourism Big Data”, supervised by Dr. Xi WANG from Division of Culture and Creativity, took half a year to analyze 100000 items of data that are related to Hengqin tourism and Hengqin Chimelong, and conduct a systematic analysis based on tourists’ consumption experiences.

Prof. Adrian Bailey, Associate Vice President (Internationalization) and Dean of DHSS, sent his congratulations. “The Division is immensely proud of our students and their accomplishments and the commitment and passion of our staff. This is for sure a significant accomplishment for the PRA programme and for UIC. It inspires all of us to have the self belief to seize opportunity and the openness to learn from each other,” said Prof. Bailey.

Dr. Richard Xu, Programme Director of PRA noted that students won awards in multiple advertising categories and in other areas with students from other programmes. “It echos with UIC’s liberal arts education, which emphasises trans-disciplinarity, creative thinking and critical thinking. Congratulations and many thanks to Dr. Hongzhou LU and Dr. Xi WANG for supervising. PRA also welcomes students from other programmes to team up with our students for various competitions,” said Dr. Xu.

Source | UIC

Text | Shuang HAO

Editor | Shuang HAO, Sylvia HOU

Pictures | Official website of the competition / provided by respondents