From the Nominator

"These articles, videos, social media posts/graphics, and emails about students facing mental health challenges helped raise more than $600,00 on our day of giving.   

To publicize our university’s day of giving, we created web articles, videos and social media graphics to promote the cause of increasing access to and reducing the stigma of receiving mental health services.  

The writer and video team collaborated on finding the “voices” of the campaign—people who had personal experience with K-State’s mental health services who were willing to share their story. Because of the sensitivity of the topic, we worked together to gather everything we needed from the subject in one sitting—video interview and photo.  

The writer and video team collaborated to create complementary pieces. The videos were embedded in the web articles, so readers could see both. We worked with our social media and email managers to create posts and emails that inspired viewers to click and view our content. Results:  

• The campaign raised $600,389 from 1,200+ donors.  

• K-State was able to provide a 24/7 teletherapy app for all students, expand suicide prevention training, and train counselors in trauma therapy and students on the spectrum.  

• Emails sent to our donor database (130,000) resulted in an open rate of 45.069%, a click to open rate of 3.095%, and an unsubscribe rate of just 0.334%.  

• Social media posts had 217,441 impressions, an engagement rate of 6%, and 1,608 link clicks.  

• Five videos received 846 views on YouTube."

From the Judges

Every institution is seeing more conversation and concern about mental health. This project addresses it directly and sensitively and it led to positive outcomes that immediately help students. Written piece was well done and provided specifics to help students. All in all, a beautifully executed submission that speaks directly to student population and alumni at large.