Adapting a Career Education campaign for local audiences

Project Snapshot: Education and Workforce

Adapting a Career Education campaign for local audiences

When it came to the state’s Career Education (CE) programs, California had a problem: the people they wanted to recruit didn’t know what CE was or what it could do for their lives. So, the state decided to challenge its community college system. In order to change the perception of “career technical education (CTE)” schools across the state needed to re-think how they were communicating their programs and find ways to adapt a statewide campaign for local audiences.

The Challenge

In 2017, California’s Community College (CCC) system set out to boost the number of students completing Career Education programs. By increasing the number of people earning associate degrees, credentials, certificates, or the acquired skill sets, they could help fill the many current and future job openings for in-demand careers across the state.

Statewide Strategy

To do this, they set out to challenge the stigma associated with Career Education as a lesser option compared to four-year, and even two-year, degree programs. Part of CCC’s recommendations included dropping the “technical” part of “career technical education.” Additionally, CCC created a state-level campaign template and photography library, as well as offered funding for local districts to market to their communities.

Local Audience Expectations

For local community colleges and districts, this created both an opportunity and a challenge. Because the statewide campaign was designed to reach a widespread and general audience, it lacked the customization needed to appeal to local students on region-specific programs.

This was the challenge Los Rios Community College District (LRCCD) partnered with 3fold to solve.

Our approach

01.

Identify and Push Key Programs

For each of the four member college schools – American River College, Cosumnes River College, Folsom Lake College, and Sacramento City College –the District first needed to identify key programs to push to maximize its marketing investment. These programs needed to check two boxes: they must be facing dwindling enrollment and be a supported and sustained career pathway upon graduation for the next 5-years.

02.

Align with the State’s Priorities

To meet funding requirements and ladder up to the statewide outreach, LRCCD needed to use the Chancellor’s office’s approach as a foundation. This meant creating a secondary focus in all marketing by boost the visibility of and changing the conversation around Career Education programs in the state.

03.

Launch the campaign

3fold developed the “Ready for More” campaign as a bridge between local and statewide goals.

First, we grouped key local programs into general industries for the campaign’s focus – Building Trades and Construction, Agriculture and Natural Resources, Health, Information Communications Technologies, Public Safety and Service, and Transportation programs.

Once identified, we recruited real students in these programs for custom photoshoots and interviews. This created a campaign that was authentic, ensuring local audiences were seeing actual students in recognizable locations.

We targeted young adults interested in reskilling or learning a new trade in the greater Sacramento region to build awareness of and drive enrollment using a mix of traditional and digital media publishers they trusted.

The media mix included:

About Los Rios Community College District

The Los Rios Community College District (LRCCD) is one of the nation’s most respected learning institutions and the second-largest community college district in California. LRCCD serves more than 75,000 students each year across five counties in the Sacramento region.

LRCCD is made up of four colleges, including Sacramento City College, Folsom Lake College, Cosumnes River College and American River College, as well as six education centers, and specialized workforce and economic development programs for local businesses, governments, and organizations.

3fold has been a proud partner with LRCCD since 2010.

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Project Snapshot: Education and Workforce