The Office of Admissions recently discovered not as many people love Loyola as much as they do.

Over the last two months, the Office of Admissions posted signs around campus advertising the “I <3  Loyola” video contest geared towards students. The contest’s purpose was to have more students involved in the process of attracting prospective students to Loyola. Salvadore Liberto, Vice President for Enrollment Management, said he wanted current students to be the ones to promote Loyola to prospective students.

“We (the Office of Admissions) can only do so much to attract students to Loyola,” Liberto said. “That’s why we came up with the ‘I <3  Loyola’ contest, to get students involved.”

The rules of the contest were simple: submit a 30 to 60 second video on life at Loyola, and the winner would receive a cash prize as well as have their video featured on the university’s Web site.

As easy as the rules seemed to be, Liberto said as of the Oct. 24 deadline not a single video was submitted into the contest.

“I don’t know what happened,” Liberto said. “We wanted to have student-generated content to show at the various college fairs we attend across the country, but something did not work.”

Liberto said students are busy, and the possibility of balancing classes, work and other extra-curricular activities could have interfered with students eagerly participating in the contest.

“I understand our students are busy, and of course we just had mid-terms,” Liberto said.
David Castillo, music junior, said he never knew about the contest until he was asked about it.

“I never knew about it,” Castillo said. “And I probably wouldn’t have participated because I didn’t have the time. 

Castillo was not the only student who was too busy to participate in the contest. Robert Schuldt, management sophomore said not only did he not have the time or the interest to submit a video, but thought the videos may not boost admission numbers.

“If it’s anything like the videos they are playing on the tv screens in the Danna Center, no one is going to pay attention,” Schuldt said. “But I see what they are trying to accomplish.”

Many departments around the university use students to boost the image towards prospective students. The Office of Admissions uses current hired students and volunteer ambassadors to give tours around the campus to prospective students, and New Student Orientation uses student leaders to provide a welcoming experience for new students. Liberto said Loyola students are the university’s best salespersons, and he wanted students to be more proactive with recruitment.

“I mean, who wants to listen to an old guy talk about Loyola?” Liberto said. “Our students make Loyola more real, more authentic.”

Liberto said although this idea may have faltered, the Office of Admissions plans to re-launch the contest at a later date, as well as other activities to have more student involvement.

“We plan to have student bloggers, and have students chat on-line with prospective students so they can get a one-on-one perspective of what life at Loyola is like,” Liberto said.

Although he did not receive any video submissions, Liberto said there are no hard feelings.

“I still love the students. I still love Loyola,” Liberto said. “I heart Loyola.”

Jauné Jackson can be reached at [email protected].