<p>"...nearly all of them look the same...At halftime, after watching student athletes bang into each other for 30 minutes, TV viewers are treated to a far more genteel scene: Researchers scurry about in lab coats and safety goggles, cellists saw away in concert halls, graduates toss their caps in the air and impeccably diverse groups of students do purposeful things while smiling."</p>
<p>^^And never a snowflake in sight, even in the ads for the most frigidly located campuses. For all the sunshine and green lawns, you’d thiink they were all in southern California.</p>
<p>^^</p>
<p>Very true…actually some look really amateurish and some look very well done.</p>
<p>My favs:</p>
<p>University of Michigan:
[YouTube</a> - The Michigan Difference PSA 2006](<a href=“The Michigan Difference PSA 2006 - YouTube”>The Michigan Difference PSA 2006 - YouTube)</p>
<p>University of Texas-Austin:
[YouTube</a> - University of Texas Ad - Sole Purpose](<a href=“- YouTube”>- YouTube)</p>
<p>An older Berkeley ad:
[YouTube</a> - [UC Berkeley] The Promise of Berkeley](<a href=“The Promise of Berkeley [UC Berkeley] - YouTube”>The Promise of Berkeley [UC Berkeley] - YouTube)</p>
<p>Other than for the wide range of production values, these halftime ads do seem to all follow the same script. But the print materials that HS students receive at their homes are wildly different, often creative, and sometimes off-the-wall bizarre. I wonder why the halftime ads are so formulaic? Perhaps because they’re aimed at a broader TV audience and student recruiting mailings are aimed at teenagers? Or maybe it’s because they all come from big-time football schools, which are less likely to be avant garde. The most creative print materials that I recall came from the U. of Chicago and Swarthmore - two schools that don’t have televised halftimes.</p>
<p>…The University of Oregon, I think, has the most creative halftime ads of all the ones Ive seen.</p>
<p>The [cool</a> thing about having an o as your symbol](<a href=“Check out this UO commercial - YouTube”>Check out this UO commercial - YouTube), A little mitosis, sub-atomic particles revolving around the big ball, locomotive wheel…</p>
<p>UCLA has some good ads of former athletes, who used their scholarships, and seriously tended to their learning. [Jackie</a> Nguyen](<a href=“Jackie Nguyen's Big UCLA Moment - YouTube”>Jackie Nguyen's Big UCLA Moment - YouTube), [Chris Joseph](<a href=“Chris Joseph's Big UCLA Moment - YouTube”>Chris Joseph's Big UCLA Moment - YouTube)</p>
<p>^ UCLA is NOT a weeder program… glad he cleared that up. :)</p>
<p>… for real life. ; )</p>
<p>Loved that Berkeley PSA!</p>
<p>This was my favorite Michigan PSA.</p>
<p>[YouTube</a> - Space Yellow PSA 2004](<a href=“Space Yellow PSA 2004 - YouTube”>Space Yellow PSA 2004 - YouTube)</p>