AAF's Most Promising Minority Students Travel to NYC

The four Texas Longhorns travelled to New York City to participate in the American Advertising Federation's 2009 Most Promising Minority Students Program. Christina Chan, Jocelyn Lai, Cecilia Wong and Linda Yang joined 36 other students from across the country at the New York Athletic Club from February 3rd to 5th. Justin Lam was named an Honor Roll student and attended all the New York activities as well.

The three-day event was comprised of many opportunities to network and gain exposure to big name advertising agencies. Students attended panels with successful advertising professionals, visited to top agencies, and networked at the career fair. Some of the big name companies at the career fair were McCann Erickson, Ogilvy, Publicis Groupe, Draftfcb, Arnold, and Grey. "With the way the economy is right now, it was a unique opportunity for us to have face time with big name agencies even if they didn't have any openings at this time," says senior Christina Chan. Face to face interaction with the large agencies is becoming increasingly important for these soon-to-be graduates. With the state of the economy and shrinking advertising budgets, finding jobs is becoming more difficult, making the MPMS program even more important. "At one point, I took a step back and realized how incredible the whole scenario was: in a low economy, recruiters were looking for top-notch students, and students were looking for top-notch careers. The entire conference really was a meeting of the best of two worlds" says Jocelyn Lai.

Not only was the experience beneficial for the students by providing exposure to top recruiters, but students also had the great chance to network with the other students. "Because the ad world is so small, we're all bound to meet again so keeping connected with these students who are recognized was a great opportunity," says Chan. This admiration was shared by all the students. "The entire experience was very inspiring because the top 40 multicultural students from across the nation were convened at one place. It was great to see that there were students of my age who possessed the same ambition, vision and dreams as I did, because ultimately, we are driving the future of the industry," Lai says.

Along with the honor of being named as one of the most promising minority students, Jocelyn Lai received an additional privilege of receiving AAF'S Advertising Hall of Fame award. "When John Osborne, CEO of BBDO NY announced that Jocelyn Shiuan Lai had received the AAF Advertising Hall of Fame award, I kept sitting there, wondering if it really was me, until the people at my table told me to go up ... because it really was me!" said Lai.

Recently, the topic of diversity in the advertising industry has been a hot debate with various top agencies facing heat for the lack of multicultural employees. However, through programs like AFF's Most Promising Minority Students, recruiters are starting to see that these talented students can bring unique skills and understanding to the table, or in this case, workplace. Lai says "It was wonderful to see that companies were genuinely interested in increasing diversity in their workplace, and not to just fulfill a quota. Instead, they were deeply looking at each individual -- their culture, their values, their background -- and what new perspective s/he could bring to enlighten and inspire new ideas."

The students were in agreement that AAF's busy schedule for the program was intense but what they learned was invaluable and completely worth every second of lost sleep.