MPTV Students Produce Promotional Videos for COD Foundation

While the College of DuPage Foundation has supported students for nearly 50 years, the organization recently received help from students in the Commercial Video Production class.

During the summer 10-week course, COD students met with the Foundation and produced two promotional videos. Split into two teams, the students wrote the scripts, conducted interviews, scouted locations, shot and edited footage, and created graphics. One video uses original music written and performed by Anthony Perry and Tony Reyes, two students from the Music program.

Watch "Support COD Students and Change Lives" and "How COD Donors Are Making a Difference."

"Jennifer Piehl and I have offered this class for seven years, but it was the first time we worked with an internal client," said Motion Picture/TV Professor Tony Venezia. "We pitched the idea of our students collaborating with the Foundation, and within 15 minutes we had a handshake."

Karen Kuhn, Interim Executive Director, College of DuPage Foundation, and Assistant Vice President of Development, College of DuPage, said the Foundation requested two videos: one that would thank donors and a second that explained what the Foundation does.

"So many people think the Foundation is just a scholarship organization, and while this is a large part of what we do, we also support the College with a variety of other initiatives," she said. "This video does a wonderful job of providing more information about us."

COD student Nicole Bauer found the experience invaluable. The Glendale Heights resident, who plans to become a director and an editor, said every person on the team took on a different role during each stage of production. For example, one of her assignments was as the researcher, which meant finding out about different donors and recipients to see who would make the best interviews. In production, she was in charge of audio and then was the editor in post-production. This meant taking all of the interviews and B-roll footage, syncing them with the recorded audio, adding the graphics that were created by fellow student Matt Miltonberger, and cutting them into the final product.

"If I hadn't taken this course, I never would have imagined the amount of work that went into creating corporate videos, especially from an editor's perspective," she said. "It was really rewarding to see how excited the COD Foundation members were to be working with us and to have their video produced by students. From pitching our first ideas to showing our first cut of the video and then to the final product, they never doubted us and their excitement only grew."

As part of the process, Venezia and Piehl would meet regularly with the students. But Venezia said the students handled all issues on their own, including those outside of the production process.

"They were always professional, and I'm very proud that we could share a part of what we do with the rest of the school," he said.

Kuhn enjoyed supporting students in a new way.

"Working with the students was really fun. We don't work directly with them on a regular basis, so it was very satisfying for myself and for my team to be invited into their classroom and talk to them," she said. "We learned about their process and they learned about what we do. And we are so pleased with the results."

For more information about the College of DuPage Foundation, visit foundation.cod.edu. For more information about the Motion Picture/TV program, visit www.cod.edu/programs/mptv.