Media Design School has made a clean sweep of the Student ORCA, with students James McCulloch & Kathryn Prince joining Robyn Ramsey & Luke Roxburgh as 2020 finalists for their campaigns aimed at getting young people to vote.

Taking inspiration from the wider Outstanding Radio Creative Awards, each year The Radio Bureau tasks AUT University and Media Design School advertising students with a creative challenge encouraging them to explore the many options afforded by radio.

Kate Humphries, Course Leader at Media Design School said, “The Radio-first challenge as always proved to be the surprise medium for the students with art directors falling in love with words, and words falling in love with copywriters.”

This year, students were assigned a brief that required them to create a radio first integrated campaign which would A) encourage first time voters to both enrol AND cast their vote in the New Zealand election. B) Encourage young people to follow guidelines during COVID-19 alert levels. Or C) Drive sales for an existing eco-friendly product available in the New Zealand market. Both finalists opted for brief option A.

Student ORCA judging was based on four criteria: creativity, execution, effectiveness and innovation. The judging panel consisted of Karen Maurice-O’Leary (Facebook Creative Shop), Antony Wilson (Creative) plus Matt Williams and Freddie Coltart from DDB who are finalists for two campaigns in this year’s ORCA.

Voting Choir by Media Design School students James McCulloch & Kathryn Prince drew on the idea that “A lot of young people don’t vote, because they believe their voices won’t make a difference”. From this, they aimed to create an audio of their combined voices, to show the scale of non-participation. Of the entry, Judge Karen Maurice-O’Leary said, “Brilliant on many fronts, great use of a bigger idea with radio at its core.”

No Opinion by Media Design School students Robyn Ramsey & Luke Roxburgh posed “the only thing worse than having an opinion is not having an opinion” and used their campaign to show young people that impartiality is dangerous, using hostage situations, house fires and plane crashes to get their message across. Judge Antony Wilson said, “Love this idea and execution. Radio lets you go BIG with your ideas and scenarios and this is a great example of that.”

ORCA and Student ORCA Winners will be announced over an awards luncheon on Thursday August 13^th at The Matisse Room in Auckland, with a release to follow shortly afterward. The winning team will receive a $700 cash prize and the runner up $300.