When prospective students come to the third floor to visit the School of Mass Communication, I chat with them about the usual topics: the content of our courses, the vast and diverse opportunities for hands-on learning through internships and student media, the accessibility of the faculty. I essentially parrot the same concepts they’ll hear from all the other “official” sources on campus – that Loyola is a great place to acquire an excellent education.
But I add something extra – a little lagniappe, as we like to say in South Louisiana. I tell them at we have a great time here.
And we do!
Sometimes the fun comes from wearing a crown to class on your birthday. (Did that earlier this month.) It may be shouting and doing the happy dance when Dr. Rogers and the Batemans win another national PR championship. Or The Maroon staff hauls home more LPA awards.
Our fun can come in a more dignified manner. Just last week the advertising copywriting class took seven random words and wrote the first paragraph of a short story. We laughed out loud at the results! (And yes, there IS a relevance to ad copywriting in that assignment.)
Several of the ad students – now the Ad Club officers – had a great time last week, sitting on the floor and chatting with Dr. Cal about the new year’s possible programs. Their enthusiasm spilled over into exuberant planning and hearty laughter.
We know how to party outside the classroom. The SMC’s annual Halloweenie Roast is a chance to drag out those crazy costumes, eat hot dogs roasted by the grillmaster, Dr. Bob, and develop a greater sense of community among our majors.
In the spring we celebrate our successes at our Spring Fiesta, sitting outside in the sunshine and listening to music – with food, of course!
And we just have an upcoming joint mixer for ad and PR majors, faculty and alums at Bruno’s. (Thursday, 5-8)
It’s not that we don’t take the work of higher education seriously. We work hard to teach and learn the fundamentals of our profession, to develop better critical thinking skills and to be of service to others. We just happen to find fun in most all we do, whether it’s the conclusion of a major project, the joy of being one semester closer to graduation or the thrill of scoring a wonderful internship.
One day, a lost high school senior and her mother wandered into my PR Cases & Campaigns class, asking to sit in. I warned them that this wasn’t a typical class; Campaigns is more like controlled chaos or kindergarteners’ time in the play yard. With a dozen or so students working in competitive teams to create promotional campaigns for nonprofit clients, it’s anything but a sedate, stereotypical college setting. Not a lot of note-taking and testing go on in Campaigns. There are tears, and there is work, lots and lots of work. But there is also laughter and a great deal of satisfaction at providing a valuable service to a worthy community organization that they might not otherwise be able to afford.
When the visiting student emerged an hour later with a big, goofy grin on her face, I knew we had a convert and a future freshman. She and her mother couldn’t say enough about how great the class was and how much everyone seemed to truly enjoy what they were doing.
And isn’t that the point? Fun and learning are not mutually exclusive. As Ben Howell Davis says, “If it isn’t any fun, why bother?”
Why indeed?
