Final Project to Professional Production: Alumni Podcast ADcademics

In recent years, California State University, Dominguez Hills has waved bye-bye to the 30-page senior papers and welcomed a new generation. It has been common tradition for college seniors to have a final class that required a massive paper from them before their time there is over. With the substitution of a senior project class, Communications students can enhance their chances of landing a job by creating a digital portfolio. One Toro in particular, Justin D. Barnette, turned his project into a professional production.

Originally a business major, his collegiate career started at community college. He founded a brand known as Twenty-Four Carat. With the success of his new company, Justin just did not have enough time to continue school. A couple years passed by and he decided to go back to his community college and earn two Associates Degrees in marketing. Once that was completed, he then transferred to Dominguez Hills to finish out his bachelor's.

"I was looking for an affordable university with an advertising major, and CSUDH perfectly fit," said Barnette.

Barnette graduated in 2019 with his Bachelor's degree in Communications with a focus in Advertising and Public Relations and currently works in strategic planning at RPA. As a student heavily interested in the creative process behind advertising, Barnette felt as if the research students conducted on their future professions just was not enough.

"I was eager to learn everything I could about advertising agencies and how they operated," said Barnette.

Which in turn, led him to come up with the idea to create a podcast known as Adcademics. The senior project has multiple stages; the creation of an online portfolio, two professional interviews, and a strategic plan followed by a project. Barnette's podcast satisfied a majority of the senior project class, while also revolutionizing the educational landscape of advertising. It was such an influential course to him and it was no surprise what his favorite course was during his time at Dominguez Hills.

"If I had to choose one course, it would be the senior project course because I was able to make a resume and portfolio that I still use today," said Barnette.

After applying for internships at several advertising agencies, Barnette successfully secured his internship at RPA. RPA is one of the largest advertising agencies in the Greater Los Angeles area and his creativity was one of the largest determining factors.

With this image of a modern advertising agency, they pride themselves on being a "collective of specialists, with deep benches of talent in nearly every discipline a modern marketer needs today," according the website. RPA also stresses the importance of the culture they have created. They attribute their hashtag #PeopleFirst as the reason their team is the best of the best. Barnette cultivated some of the brightest professionals in the advertising field in established brands and other professionals in smaller organizations in order to start ADcademics.

Wieden+Kennedy, Google, Deutsch, BBH, Omnicom, Saatchi & Saatchi, 72andSunny, Ogilvy, PhD, and RPA are just a few of the professional agencies interviewed by Justin. The podcast provides an overview of the basic questions about the tons of positions in advertising, while also providing a platform for his interviewees.

ADcademics is now in its second season and has a number of interviews from different agencies, even alumni such as Dhanushka Kumarasinghe and Rosemarie Sanchez.

Kumarasinghe is the Advertising Operations Planner at Saatchi & Saatchi and has been integral in several Toyota campaigns within the past two years. In 2017, Dhanushka took part in the CSU Research Competition as well as the CSUDH Student Research Day. He was not even supposed to present at the CSUDH competition due to a family emergency, but still presented and was not able to stay for his first place prize. If he hadn't presented that day, he would not have been qualified for the state-wide competition at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.

Rosemarie Sanchez is currently a part-time professor here at Dominguez while also working for PhD Media. She teaches an Advertising Media Analysis class and is also the Director of Media Strategy at PhD Media which manages some massive clients. Her biggest client is Audi, which says a lot about her expertise on the subject. Most recently, she played a major role in the development of Audi's Superbowl commercial here in the United States.

Barnette's interviews go in-depth with the responsibilities expected from their journey through the advertising and public relations field.

Experience his show for yourself and make sure to keep up to date with his upcoming episodes by following the podcast on SoundCloud @ADcademics.