Spoiler Alert!

Originally I thought this would be a great name for a band that created lyrics/song titles based around endings to good movies, books, etc. (for example: ‘Dumbledore Dies’), but today, ‘spoiler alert!’ means this:

I’m about to spill my beans.

Its that time of year again where second-year students at Adcenter get together to argue about Sixty, the annual AdCenter publication sent to over 8,000 agencies at the end of the year.

And every year this is what happens:

We argue about how it should look
We argue about what content should/shouldn’t be in it
Most important, we argue about whether or not it should have a theme.

And although there wasn’t a theme for Sixty last year, I’m noticing one forming already this year.

Politics.

Students talking trash about professors and peers. Professors favoring students. Art directors and Copywriters with hidden agendas. Lately, it seems the only dependable thing at the Adcenter is the vending machine.

And it stopped taking dollar bills last week.

However, as pessimistic as I sometimes am about this school and the industry I am voluntarily about to enter, the more I think about it, the more I think I am just idealistic.

That’s why I propose one of the themes of this year’s annual should be this:


TRUST


As in:

Trust in the system
Trust that the instructors were hired for a good reason
Trust that everyone got into Adcenter for a good reason
Trust that everyone will find a job upon leaving
Trust that the agency that hires you and its clients will trust you enough to do good work
Trust that they will tell you when you don’t
Trust that people who work the hardest and smartest will be rewarded
Trust that people who don’t work will be found out
Trust the criticism of those you respect/admire most
But trust your gut instincts
Trust that good ideas can’t be forced
And when they don’t come, trust it’s not the end of the world
Trust that everyone has their own set of strengths and weaknesses
And that someone else’s strength doesn’t make you weak
Trust that your closest friends and family will forgive you when you are distracted or forget to return a call
And trust that they will listen when you call home whining about work
Last but not least, trust that we can/will create a great Sixty if left to our own devices and with a little bit of guidance.

I don’t really expect this to be the theme, but I figured if we’re going to just turn into jaded advertising asshole/client burn-outs in 20 years anyway, might as well give this whole ‘trust’ thing a shot.

Otherwise, we could always just go with the theme of high school yearbook.

Yah, that would kick-ass.