The organizers of last year’s Florida Blogging & Social Media Conference, which was held in Full Sail Live, returned to campus on Friday to host FLBlogCon EDU. Educators and K-12 students from local schools – along with a few Full Sail students and staff members – spent the day attending a series of presentations in the Entertainment Business building. The goal of the event was to encourage students and teachers to blog and use social media more often.

Featured presentations covered topics like “Podcasting – Why it Works and Is Easy to Do” and “Putting Your Best Digital Footprint Forward!”, and presenters included local bloggers Josh Murdock  and Bess Auer, The Educators’ Spin On It co-creator Kim Vij (pictured above), and former Full Sail Course Director Kerry O’Shea Gorgone.

The Florida Blogging & Social Media Conference is held annually in the fall.

Where you decide to go to college is a huge decision and an incredibly important investment, and Full Sail offers a wide range of financial support to incoming students who have the desire to succeed in the entertainment and media industries.

There are currently more than a dozen scholarships available for potential campus and online students. And while the requirements for each one vary, most of them involve filling out an application and writing an essay. These funding opportunities go directly towards tuition balance and are available to qualified applicants across a wide range of degree programs.*

A few of the scholarships available for new students include:

• The Emerging Technology Scholarship, which awards up to $40,000 for students interested in the technology side of entertainment and media. This scholarship is available for qualified students who enroll in the on-campus Digital Arts & Design, Mobile Development, Software Development, or Web Design & Development degree programs.
• The Global Achievement Scholarship, which encourages the development of entertainment and media professionals worldwide by awarding up to $5,000 to qualified international students.
• The Anniversary Scholarship, which awards up to $10,000 to students enrolled in 20-or 21-month campus Bachelor’s Degree programs who express a long-term commitment to the entertainment media industry.
• The Pathfinder Scholarship, which awards up to $6,500 to qualified online students who prove to be passionate and dedicated to receiving an online education.

You can download the latest version of Full Sail’s Scholarship Guide here, which provides a full list of the scholarships available, along with details and eligibility requirements for each. If you have any questions after reviewing the guide or you’re interested in applying, contact an admissions representative at 800.226.7625.

*Financial aid is available to those who qualify.

You are your own brand – and when you’re applying for jobs in your chosen industry, it’s important that you make that brand as appealing as possible. So, how do you do that? Industry experts and Full Sail faculty members offer a few of their tips for harnessing the power of the Internet to create a memorable personable brand.

• Have Some Personality. Entertainment Business Bachelor’s Department Chair Heather Torres says that a lot of times people will think, “This is my professional image,” so they have to be professional. But employers actually like people with personality, and it’s okay to have personality as long as it’s not too offensive. Heather also says that employers look for transparency: they want to know who you are as a person both professionally and personally, so give that to them.
• Create a Personal Branding Statement. Write a short (2-3 sentences long) statement to describe your brand passion, your brand attributes, and what makes you stand out, suggests Internet Marketing Course Director Diane Diaz. It’s an easy way to be able to convey something important about yourself to any potential employer. It should be memorable and impactful.
• Every Social Media Platform Has a Specific Purpose. Full Sail Entertainment Business Master’s grad and brand strategist Phil Pallen says that you need to make sure you create social media accounts on your targeted audience’s preferred platforms. Twitter and YouTube are good if you’re a comedian or entertainer, while Instagram and Pinterest are great for visual artists. Also: don’t create a bunch of profiles on different mediums and then ignore them. According to Diana, by not saying something, that says something.
• Jazz up your Twitter bio. The experts on this panel agreed that Twitter is a must-have in the entrainment industry. Phil offers up a very specific way to write your twitter bio. It should be two sentences: The first sentence should answer the question of who you are and why people should care. The second sentence should give people an indication of your personality. That way, you get your personality in there, and not just boring credentials.

And remember, your personal brand goes beyond who you are online. Says Heather: “Every interaction you have in every social situation represents your personal brand. The way you dress, the things you say, the conversations you have, all of that is part of who you are. You have to be aware of those things at all times.”

Check out more personal branding tips in the “You.com: How to Create a Powerful Personal Brand” panel from Full Sail’s Fifth Annual Hall of Fame Celebration.

For more video footage of the guest speakers and industry panels at the Fifth Annual Hall of Fame Celebration, visit Full Sail University’s YouTube page.

When he’s not busy with school, Sports Marketing & Media online student Sam Kimmel (pictured above, center) heads up the League of Leaders, a recreational sports league he formed earlier this year in his hometown of Indiana, Pennsylvania. The league – currently wrapping up its trial period with about 20 athletes – will officially launch in June with more sponsors, more equipment, and more participants.

“I had a lot of friends growing up who for various reasons weren’t able to participate in sports,” says Sam, who mentions drinking and drug use as a couple of those reasons. “So I started this league and thought, maybe I can help people out too. It was sports-driven at first, but I really want to give people an alternative to getting in trouble as well as hopefully create leaders and give them an opportunity.”

Sam plans to have basketball, street hockey, soccer, and potentially football as the featured sports in the league. Athletes will draft their own teams, games will take place on the weekends, and every team will make it into the playoffs at the end of the season. The League of Leaders is open to high school and young college students, and Sam hopes in the future he can expand into other cities. He’d love for the athletes to have a chance to play somewhere like Pittsburgh’s Hines Field.

“I’ve always wanted to be engaged in the sports world in some way,” says Sam, who also just started his own online radio show. “I want to be involved in sports radio, so anyway I can get my foot in the door with that is great.”

Last week was a great example of the real-world experience students have the opportunity to gain in Full Sail’s Sports Marketing & Media program. In the span of just a few days, students were involved with the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament, the PGA’s Arnold Palmer Invitational, and Major League Baseball’s Spring Training, among other events.

Through Full Sail’s relationship with the Central Florida Sports Commission, around 50 students worked as volunteers last Wednesday through Saturday during the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament games that were held at Orlando’s Amway Center. (Student volunteers also came from the Entertainment Business and Music Business programs.) According to Sports Events and Entertainment Course Director Kathryn Stuart, who helped organize the group, students worked in a various number of roles, including assisting the catering department, organizing volunteer check-in, and serving as locker room attendants and bench coordinators during team practices.

“I was a team bench coordinator on Wednesday, and it was so cool to be court side and get to watch each team practice,” says Sports Marketing & Media student Andrew Heinz. Bench coordinators were responsible for replenishing each team’s water and towel supply. “The entire experience was something that I’ll never forget.”

Another group of seven Sports Marketing & Media students worked in the Media & Communications Center during the NCAA Tournament. Sports Business Models Course Director George McNeilly – whose company McNeilly Communications was the official media liaison for the tournament’s local organizing committee – oversaw the team of students who worked as media runners, providing real-time game stats to journalists, operating the camera for press conference and interviews, and helping out wherever other media assistance was needed.

“We provided the local organizing committee with a social media strategy in support of our overarching communications strategy that helped sell out the arena,” says George. “I can’t wait to see these students grow in their careers. It’s going to be great to watch.”

Earlier last week, George also organized a trip for about 20 Sports Marketing & Media students to the Arnold Palmer Invitational at the Bay Hill Club and Lodge. During the remote learning experience students heard presentations from PGA officials and other sports executives who discussed the logistics that go into hosting and covering a major golf tournament.

And on Friday, Sports Marketing & Media Program Director Josh Mora took 13 students – all within six months of graduation and with high GPS scores – to Bradenton, Florida, where they attended an informational session with executives from the Pittsburgh Pirates, Baltimore Orioles, Houston Astros, and Minor League Baseball organizations. Students had the chance to ask the executives questions and even got to stick around to watch a bit of a Spring Training game afterwards.

In addition, two student volunteers served as runners during last week’s NFL Owners’ Meetings and another student helped out at the Red Bull Tampa Pro 2014 skateboard competition.

“I know as I hear from them that it really helps put their classroom experiences and education in context, because they really get to see the application of it all,” says Josh. “What an amazing week that we could provide so many opportunities for so many different students.”

Who’s ready for Spring Break?

Whether you’ve got awesome travel plans, are heading back home, or are just hanging around campus for the week, we’ve got a few suggestions for how to have a fulfilling few days away from school.

Reach out to potential employers. Career Development Advisor Tony Mardini suggests that students nearing graduation call studios or companies they’re interested in interning or working at to find out who they should send their resume to. “Have a script ready. It just needs to be a couple of sentences,” says Tony. “Something like, ‘Good morning, my name is Tony and I’m about to graduate from Full Sail. I’m calling to find out who I should send my resume to for applying for an internship.’” Tony suggests reaching out to 3-5 studios or companies – it will be motivating to know people are interested in seeing your resume.

See a movie. A few of the new releases in theaters now include Captain America: The Winter Soldier (which several Full Sail grads worked on), Transcendence, Oculus, The Grand Budapest Hotel, and Noah.

Volunteer Your Time. Helping out a nonprofit organization is an easy, rewarding way to make your resume more impressive and earn GPS points. Kari Ramirez in Full Sail’s Professional Development department suggests checking the Community Volunteer Opportunities page on Connect, which provides information on both local and national organizations in need of volunteers.

Play a game. Settle in for a gaming marathon with one of the popular recent releases like Titanfall, Dark Souls II, or Infamous: Second Son.

Revamp your social media sites. Spring Break is a good time to start making sure your social media accounts are appropriate for a professional environment, says Career Development Advisor Jess Pollak. “Make sure you’re following the up and comers in your industry and you’re interacting with them as well,” she says. Jess also suggests getting on LinkedIn and connecting with grads from your degree program who are currently working in the industry. “A lot of Full Sail grads are willing to help other grads,” she says. “It’s all about getting in touch and networking with them.”

Go to a show. If you’re staying near campus for Spring Break, artists stopping by Orlando include Manchester Orchestra (April 19, House of Blues Orlando), Cloud Nothings (April 21, The Social), and Tycho (April 25, The Beacham). If you’re elsewhere, you can see what concerts are happening in your hometown on pollstar.com.

Catch up on sleep. Don’t forget to get some rest, so you can come back from break the week after next ready to conquer all of your coursework.

Any other ideas? Tell us about them in the comments below!

Singer/songwriter Andy Grammer came to campus this April to play an intimate concert at our performing arts venue Full Sail Live. Andy has released the full-length album Andy Grammer and follow-up EP Crazy Beautiful, with the singles “Keep Your Head Up” and “Fine By Me” hitting Billboard’s Hot 100 chart.

A select group of tickets were given out to the public, as well as students and staff, who were treated to a six-song acoustic set that included his latest release, “Back Home.” Andy followed his last song with a meet and greet, where he signed autographs, posed for pictures, and spoke with fans.

The concert was sponsored by local radio station Mix 105.1, who interviewed Andy before the show about his visit, performance, and new music. Students from our Show Production program were also on hand to help produce the event alongside Full Sail staff.

Seattle’s Space Needle is among the great U.S. structures. Opened in 1962, the tower stretches over 600 feet high, with an observation deck and restaurant at the top overlooking the city’s downtown and surrounding mountains. The design recalls the height of 60s space race culture, with its saucer-shaped dome and curved supports, and that retro aesthetic was the inspiration behind its new website developed by Royale.

Originally founded in Los Angeles in 2007 by Brien Holman, Jen Lucero, and Jayson Whitmore, the award-winning design studio opened a Seattle branch last year, with the Space Needle project among their first major efforts. Their redesign of the site captures the spirit of the era the Needle was built, and updates it with innovative web features. Graphics and facts glide onto the screen as you scroll up from its base to the top of the tower, and keeps going with some surprises as you climb miles into space.

“Space Needle needed a new website and we wanted to create something that was fun and that was using some newer technology,” Jayson Whitmore says. “Overall we wanted to make something that was intuitive and easy to use, and was also a little tongue-in-cheek. It’s a very simple site that was beautifully designed and has gotten a lot of recognition – the team worked really hard on it.”

Jayson is a three-time Full Sail graduate and 2009 Hall of Fame inductee, and the opening of Royale’s Seattle branch has been a proud achievement for him and the studio’s co-founders as they explore new territory. While the L.A. office has made a name for itself with motion graphics work for Apple, Nike, Toyota, and MTV, Seattle is primarily focused on the digital realm, and how to blend Royale’s style with content for different platforms.

“It had been on the back of mine and my business partners’ minds that an expansion into that world was necessary, and its been incredible,” he says. “When we opened up the shop in Seattle it had three people and now we’re up to about 25, and have been jamming out some really innovative products. We have some incredibly talented thinkers up there that influence our work down here.”

There’s a clear symbiotic relationship between the two branches, with a focus on making them feel like one studio in terms of communication and workflow, while still having their own unique culture that helps inform each other’s output. Jayson sees the Space Needle project as just the beginning of what Royale as a whole can contribute to the digital industry, and they have been experimenting with coding, game engines, and experimental data tracking, and how to use them to help brands communicate to the world in an attractive and engaging way.

“I haven’t been this excited about our industry in a really long time,” he says. “We have a lot of other projects coming up that I can’t talk about that are very exciting and innovative, so we’ve only just scratched the surface of where we’re going in the integration of media. It’s a time to expand out and dream big, and it’s up to ourselves not to hold back and make it happen. There’s no reason why we can’t help define the next phase of what the digital language will be.”

Full Sail’s annual Memorial Day Celebration saw students, faculty, and staff gather on the walkway near FS2 on Friday to remember the men and women who have died serving our country. Although the event started soberly with a memorial ceremony, there was plenty of fun and celebrating as well. The opening ceremony included live music by Full Sail staff members Marcus Ealy and Joel Pickering and heartfelt speeches from staff member Troy East, Ret. Col. Mike Pendergast, and Full Sail President Garry Jones.

The event included food, music, prizes, and a dunk-a-veteran tank. Clubs and veteran associations came out to show their support and networked with attendees. On display were memorial walls for fallen soldiers along with an artwork area where students could paint and draw during the festivities. One of the highlights of the event was the field of flags, where 2,217 individual flags were displayed to represent and thank each Full Saul students who has served in the military.

Check out a few photos from the event below.

When you visit a new airport, hospital, or train station – how do you know where to go? How do you know where to find customs, the emergency room, arrival and departure schedules, or visitor parking? The easy answer is ‘signs’ of course. But there’s a lot more to ‘placing signs’ and moving people than you might imagine.

More formally, the art and science of directing people in motion in major facilities is called ‘wayfinding,’ which falls under the category of environmental design.

Most people never think about what goes into planning the signage in places like airports or bus stations. People mainly only consider signage when it’s not done well and they can’t find what they’re looking for.

But according to award-winning designer Howard York, who specializes in wayfinding and corporate branding, a good wayfinding campaign can take many months to carry out. Designers involved in wayfinding are typically working alongside architects and must take into consideration not only messaging, but safety, security, engineering, branding, and accessibility.

York, who teaches within Full Sail’s Media Design MFA program, has headed up wayfinding and physical corporate branding campaigns for a number of high-profile facilities, including the King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, more than 7,000 Taco Bell stores, Exxon and Esso gas stations worldwide, and Nashville’s Music City Central bus terminal.

According to York, there is a lot of research involved in wayfinding. There’s general research that involves how people see things – for instance, how the color and size of a sign and available light affects visibility. Wayfinding projects also depend on project-specific research. For York’s work on the Music City Central bus terminal, the team was able to use data collected by the Nashville Metropolitan Transit Authority relating to passenger bus usage, peak hours, and off-hours at the original bus terminal.

Based on the traffic data and the floor plans for the new facility, the Nashville team developed user patterns. These were in the form of blueprints, but they could also be computer simulations. “The client signs off on these, and they basically [indicate], ‘These are where the people are going to go,’” says York. “You have to design for worse-case. You don’t design for off-hours, you design for peak hours. So that’s step one.”

Wayfinding diagrams of the King Khalid International Airport in Saudia Arabia.

Step two involves designing the signs. “There are three types of signs: information, identification, and direction. All signage falls under those three categories,” says York. “Information tells you where a destination is, identification basically identifies that destination – restaurant, men’s room, information booth. And then you have directional signs, which basically get you to and from those destinations. Based on the user diagrams, we determined that there were about 25 different types of signs that we needed, falling under the information, identification, and direction categories.”

For the Music City Central bus terminal, York had to create a number of signs and markers to make the main bus throughway safer.

“What happens is that the buses come in and go right across where people are crossing,” says York. “This is a two-way. The problem here is you’re going to look left here to see that there’s a bus coming, and as you’re crossing the crosswalk, you’re going to think it’s clear, and the bus [could] hit you from the right.”

To solve this problem, York and his team designed hanging stop signs at each crosswalk for the buses. They also made sure that people could only cross at the crosswalks by adding physical barriers (including tactile sidewalk strips for the blind) and placing multiple ‘No Pedestrian’ signs in the areas outside of the crosswalks.

Because he was designing for the “Music City,” York included music symbols in part of the wayfinding design. Rather than being labeled by number, “Every single floor in the parking garage was a different musical instrument,” says York.

Once all the signs were designed and categorized (including size, color, material, message, location, and lighting), the complete design package was then submitted to a sign fabricator, who actually made and installed all the signs.

York says that wayfinding is present in some form in every facility, although in some, it’s more of an afterthought. “It really works well when it’s brought in early, and it’s part of the whole design process,” says York.

Although wayfinding involves a technical mindset and an understanding of architecture and design, it could be a good fit for someone with a background in animation and simulation, says York.

York says wayfinding and signage is a rewarding field. “It’s pretty exciting when I go [somewhere] and see my work up on the building,” says York. “I mean it’s very rewarding. Sure, you can click on a website, but it’s not the same as having something in the real environment.”

The FIFA World Cup has been unavoidable this summer, with a month of matches featuring soccer’s best competing for global bragging rights. This year’s games wrapped on July 13 with a championship match in Rio de Janeiro between Argentina and Germany, and Full Sail soccer fans came out to support their favorite team with a finals celebration in the Full Sail Live Venue.

Open to students and staff, the event kicked off with a red carpet walk into the Venue at 2 p.m., with the match starting shortly after at 3 p.m. Food was provided for attendees, some of which came decked out in team jerseys and carrying flags. The halftime break also featured a prize giveaway

This group joined over 26 million Americans who tuned in for the event, making it one of the most-watched soccer games in U.S. history, and you can check out highlights from the Full Sail celebration in the gallery below.

English Composition Course Director Amy Watkins Copeland wants you to know that it’s okay to bother her. ”Your instructors are a resource,” she says. “My favorite part of the job is interacting with students one-on-one and working to help make their writing better.”

Composition is a required course, which means Amy and the rest of her department are faced with a unique challenge when developing curriculum. Because every student takes the class, its content needs to be applicable across degree programs. In response to this, Amy’s team has come up with a series of interdisciplinary assignments geared toward real world application. One assignment asks students to write a Kickstarter pitch. Another has them writing about a specific problem in their industry in order to come up with a workable solution. Students engage in a good amount of peer review in the form of discussion board posts and responses. And of course they receive lots of focused, detailed feedback from instructors, though it is on the student to ask for help if they find themselves struggling.

“Students are sometimes fearful to speak up and say, ‘I don’t get this.’ They’re afraid that they’re going to look foolish, or that they’re going to be bothering us. That’s really not true. We’re here for them.”

Currently, composition is only offered online, something that Amy views as a distinct advantage. Instead of placing an instructor in the distant position of lecturer, the online format fosters interaction and allows instructors to troubleshoot problems in real time.

All Full Sail faculty brings industry experience to the table, and Amy is no exception.  In addition to a background in publishing and writing for advertising and marketing, she’s published poetry and non-fiction in numerous anthologies and magazines, including an essay appearing in Animal: A Beast of a Literary Magazine that was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She continues to submit work to publications in her spare time. “Seeing my name in print always feels good, but I still get rejection letters. That’s a fact of life,” she says. Instead of letting rejections get you down, she suggests using them as a case study. Ask yourself, what’s not working? Then adjust and submit again.

In February Amy released her first chapbook—a limited run, hand-bound book of poems—through Yellow Flag Press. The book is titled Milk & Water.  The publisher calls it, “a narrative of love and loss and the fears that drive every day life.”

Amy describes the book as very personal. “Most of the poems are about my mother and daughter and a lot of people I love.”

Balancing her own writing and her professional duties can be challenging, but Amy has a trick for striking a balance.

“It’s important to always feed your creative energy,” she says. This means letting herself approach art in a way that’s playful. In addition to writing, she’s also a visual artist—she paints and hand builds ceramics. These additional artistic outlets offer a creative freedom, one she can enjoy whether a project turns out or not.

Ultimately, she says, you have to find what works for you. It’s something she tells her students when they hit a wall in their own writing. Inspiration is a wonderful thing when it happens, but you can’t always count on it to strike when you need it.

“I tell my students this when we talk about writing process. The artist Chuck Close says, ‘Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show up and get to work.’ And that is true. Inspiration is what you live for as an artist, but that’s not always what you make your living on.”

Entertainment and Music Business students and staff had the opportunity to give back to the community as well as see what goes into planning and executing a large-scale charity event when they volunteered for the 2014 Mascot Games at the Amway Center. The Games took place July 25-26 and benefited New Hope for Kids, an organization dedicated to supporting children who have experienced the loss of a loved one, and providing seriously ill children with once in a lifetime experiences through their Children’s Wish Program. The family friendly, gladiator style competition featured 30 Mascots from MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL, AFL, and NCAA teams around North America.

Jamie Elasick, who teaches the Event Management course and also served on the planning committee for the event, said, “Planning began at the tail end of 2013 and it has been an amazing ride. Over 80 Full Sailors participated in a variety of ways leading up to and at the games. I was excited to be able to extend the opportunity to so many students to get hands-on experience with a variety of planning aspects for the event, and I’m proud of the hard work and dedication that they showed throughout the days.”

Leadership and Organizational Behavior instructor Maria Spitale added, “The students loved seeing the excitement on the children’s faces during the games. Knowing the importance of this charity to the community made the time spent worth while.”

Pure Motivation also represented Full Sail at the event. 43 Volunteer Initiative Participants (VIPs) showed up on Saturday to assist with setting up and ushering in spectators.

Students were able to translate aspects of their coursework into field experience as a result of volunteering. Because of the nature of the event, volunteers were able to fill whatever role they expressed an interest in. For some, this meant running social media for the Games. For others, it meant interacting with guests, or even the mascots themselves.

“The mascots were a joy to work with,” said Entertainment and Music Business Lab Specialist Marianthy Troupos. “Some of them have been participating in this even for years because they strongly believe in what New Hope stands for. I can’t wait for next year!”

Unpaid internships have been taking a hit in the media lately. Former interns have been filing class-action lawsuits against their former employers more frequently than ever before, alleging they are owed unpaid wages for the hours of work they performed.

There are definitely some exploitative internships out there – ones that don’t meet the standards for unpaid internships set forth by the U.S. Department of Labor – but that doesn’t mean every unpaid opportunity is a total waste of time.

“The first job I received was from an internship,” says Cassi Willard, Esq., the Advanced Entertainment Law Course Director in Full Sail’s Entertainment Business Master’s program. “It was unpaid initially, but it branched into amazing networking and job opportunities. So, personally, I think [internships] are a huge leg up, particularly if your background doesn’t include a lot of work or industry experience.”

If you find a promising opportunity that will give you great experience and boost your resume, then yes, you should take that unpaid internship, says Cassi. Tammy Elliott, Vice President of Full Sail’s Career Development department, agrees.

We spoke with Tammy and Cassi about unpaid internships and what students should know about them. Follow this advice to make sure you’re taking the right opportunity.

DO your research. According to Tammy, this is the most important advice of all, and absolutely shouldn’t be overlooked. “Sometimes these [unpaid] internships are the only way to get your foot in the door,” she says, “and my response to students is always, you best be sure that you want to be on the other side of that door.”

DO ask questions, and lots of them. You need to make sure the internship is the right one for you. Research the company beforehand, and make sure you’re asking important questions in the interview: What are my responsibilities? Who’s going to be mentoring me? Will you work around my schedule? What are the potential opportunities for me after this internship is over?

DON’T get exploited. In order for an unpaid internship to be legal, it has to meet six guidelines laid out by the Department of Labor:

• The internship, even though it includes actual operation of the facilities of the employer, is similar to training which would be given in an educational environment.
• The internship experience is for the benefit of the intern.
• The intern does not displace regular employees, but works under close supervision of the existing staff.
• The employer that provides the training derives no immediate advantage from the activities of the intern; and on occasion its operations may actually be impeded.
• The intern is not necessarily entitled to a job at the conclusion of the internship.
• The employer and the intern understand that the intern is not entitled to wages for the time spent in the internship.

Source: U.S. Department of Labor

In addition to helping students find and apply for internships, Tammy says the Career Development department frequently works with small and mid-size companies to make sure they’re aware that they need to meet these requirements if they’re looking to add unpaid interns to their roster. If you find yourself in an adverse working situation, immediately address your issues with your mentor.

DO reach out to former interns. Cassi suggests looking for people on LinkedIn who have interned at the company you’re interested in, and asking them about their experience. “Make sure you vet whatever opportunities you have very thoroughly, because not only is it your first experience in the industry potentially, but it is also now a line on your resume,” says Cassi. “It may not be an affiliation you want and it may not be an opportunity worth forgoing something else that’s already out there.”

DON’T do an internship just to get it done, says Tammy. “Do an internship because it affords something of value to you and your career path.”

DO keep looking for what’s next. “Many students think once they’ve accepted an internship, they need to be completely devoted and stop everything else they’re doing,” says Tammy. “You don’t have to.” Be devoted to the hours you work your internship, yes, but spend your other time networking, freelancing, working a part-time job, and looking for a full-time job. It’s all about working toward that next step.

Full Sail University, a leader in providing degree programs in the fields of entertainment and media, received two of the highest honors given by the Florida Association of Postsecondary Schools and Colleges (FAPSC).

Full Sail student Harmony Jones was named the 2014 Graduate of the Year for her outstanding civic contributions and educational success. Full Sail University, based in Central Florida, was named the 2014 School of the Year at the FAPSC annual conference held recently in Miami.

Military veteran Harmony Jones first graduated from Full Sail University in 2002 with an associates in Recording Arts, then enlisted in the U.S. Army. Her talents and skills led her to be assigned to the Army band and chorus during a tour in Europe. Her active duty and civilian assignments included Germany, Iraq, Qatar, and Kuwait.

Jones was seriously wounded in a vehicle accident in Kuwait. After months of physical therapy, she decided upon recovery to take on a new challenge – going back to school. She returned to Full Sail University and completed her second degree, a bachelor’s in Entertainment Business.

Upon graduation, Jones moved to Dubai to work as a program and presentations coordinator for a company involved in a multi-billion dollar airport expansion. Her passion for learning continues as she pursues a master’s degree in Business Intelligence at Full Sail University.

“Harmony’s journey has clearly been an incredible one. But what is more incredible is her courageous and giving attitude,” said Curtis Austin, executive director of FAPSC. “She continues to serve others – offering advice and assisting them with their decision making about post-graduation life.”

As FAPSC School of the Year, Full Sail was recognized for its many unique offerings, including the Global Professional Standard program. GPS tracks students throughout their education to ensure they are well rounded in the technical and professional skills sought by potential employers.

Full Sail also is a model for forging civic and creative partnerships that extend learning outside of the classroom. One initiative is Pure Motivation, a series of monthly events that bring Full Sail’s student body together to help aid Central Florida community-based organizations in need. Among the university’s industry collaboration initiatives, Full Sail University and the sports entertainment company WWE announced a partnership where episodes of the WWE’s NXT series are taped in the Full Sail Live Venue, and Full Sail students receive hands-on learning opportunities and unprecedented access to participate in production roles behind the scenes with the WWE’s professional production crew.

“Full Sail University strives to provide students with an innovative style of education delivered by a staff of dedicated individuals focused on preparing students for career opportunities available in the ever-growing and constantly evolving creative fields of entertainment and media,” Austin said.

FAPSC has been the voice of Florida’s career schools since 1956. The association of more than 250 members works on behalf of the more than 1,000 licensed private career schools and colleges in Florida that prepare 300,000 students each year for employment by offering degree programs, certification and training.

There’s no doubt about it: we are living inside a technological boom. Innovation is accelerating at exponential rates. Full Sail’s newest on-campus bachelor’s degree in Emerging Technology and Systems Engineering is geared toward the cutting edge of what’s happening in the tech industry right now, as well as the future of systems management.

Currently, there’s over one exabyte (equal to one billion gigabytes) of data collected in the cloud. According to a recent article in Forbes, cloud computing is an estimated $13 billion industry. Projections by technology research firm Gartner reveal that number could be as high as $180 billion by 2015.

Every indication points to the cloud-computing trend continuing its meteoric ascent, and for good reason. Moving data storage to the cloud has the potential to increase a company’s return on investment (ROI) via a number of practical considerations. Businesses located in urban centers pay premium prices for square footage, and onsite IT hardware can take up a lot of space and energy resources. Cloud systems allow companies to scale as they grow, rather than constantly having to expand and reconfigure expensive hardware. Reliability is also a factor. Because data centers in most cloud systems tend to be linked, the chance of an entire cloud system experiencing a blackout due to the failure of one component is minimal.

“We’re looking at abstracting the information from the systems,” says Jay Bunner, Emerging Technology and Systems Engineering’s Program Director. “We’re no longer tying something to a physical piece of hardware, we’re looking at it more from a software perspective.”

Aside from financial considerations, the departure from physical network-based systems is partially due to the fact that more and more consumers are turning to streaming services for things like music and movies. We’re also taking our data to go. 91% of adults in the US own a cell phone, and over 50% of adults in the US own a smart phone. On a professional level, most of us use the cloud every day as a way to store and share documents and multimedia.

“We’re living in an age of ubiquitous internet access,” says Jay. “It’s fast and reliable and it’s anywhere we go. As a result, we now look at computing as a utility. One computer is as good as the next. If I put my files in the cloud, hardware matters less.”

Jay says the goal of the program is to give students the right tools and enough foundational knowledge to innovate within the field as it grows. Traditional IT programs might include a class or two on cloud technology, but Full Sail’s program has been designed to adapt to an ever-evolving field. Much of the coursework will happen through hardware visualization, a process that allows students to run multiple servers and software on a single physical computer. This will allow students to simulate scenarios involving cloud deployment, data security, and performance. The ideal candidate for the program is someone who likes hands-on projects, enjoys problem solving, and is interested in what makes the web work.

“It’s something that’s always changing,” Jay says. “Continuing education is a big part of this industry.”

Like all Full Sail bachelor’s degrees, this one is accelerated, unfolding over 21 months.

“In [that time frame], we have no idea what the technology will be. I like to say that the things we’re trying to prepare students for—the technology or the software may not even exist at this point. And as a result, the jobs that they’re going to be doing may not be out there yet. 20 months from now, there may be a new type of job that our students are prepared to do because they’ve had all this experience and they now have a background in fundamentals, but that job title itself doesn’t even exist yet.”

A few weeks back, Guardians of the Galaxy opened to huge box office numbers, pulling in over $94 million in opening weekend revenue and smashing the all time record for an August debut. The success of Guardians is due in no small part to the film’s digital characters. Rocket Raccoon (voiced by Bradley Cooper) and his trusty companion Groot (Vin Diesel) quite frankly steal the show. 2011 Hall of Fame Inductee Laurie Brugger, who worked as lead rigger on the film, says while the trend of fully digital characters taking center stage may feel like an industry shift, Hollywood is actually coming back around to embrace non-human characters as more than supporting roles.

“Fictional stories have always included leading roles for fantastical characters, and films have always moved to reflect this,” she says, “just look at ET! With technology advancing and experience growing, it’s becoming cheaper to do this every year and therefore more appealing to studios. People often ask me why visual effects are becoming ‘more and more expensive’ and I think the opposite is true.  They are being used way more, and more decisions are being made during post-production.”

Although Rocket and Groot aren’t human, they’re written to encompass a host of human emotions. This makes them relatable to the audience, but presented a challenge for the animators.

“Part of what makes emotions and expressions readable are wrinkles and landmarks in the face. On a raccoon these are shaped differently or don’t exist and can be almost invisible through long black fur which masks them. This was not only a rigging challenge but a challenge across the board,” says Laurie.

“Lighting and eye direction were troublesome due to the skull shape and dark eyes. No eyebrow bone makes brow expressions difficult to read from multiple directions because the eye cover fold doesn’t squish or collide against anything before it gets to the eyeball.”

So how did Laurie get around these complications? By studying human and raccoon musculature in order to find tiny similarities between species. She also remained true to the character’s ultimate nature.

“Comparative anatomy is always key, and very effective in relation to the actual behavior of the underlying skin and the animation controls to generate lip sync and human expression.  And of course identifying and adding animalistic controls and deformations is vital.”

Laurie is thrilled with the movie’s success. “At the end what counts is the storytelling, writing and acting,” she says. “When it’s well received in the public, that’s the cherry on top.”

Now What? is a series dedicated to providing strategies for a successful post graduate experience. Have a suggestion for a topic you’d like to see featured here? Let us know in the comments.

You’ve spent the last 21 months working toward your degree, safe and supported in the immersive bubble of your education. You’ve graduated, and you’re ready to spend the rest of your life doing the thing you love (and are now qualified to do). There’s just one problem. How are you going to pay your bills in the time it takes to get your next project off the ground?

You might consider applying for grants. Grant organizations provide support in the form of time and space to pursue your art—whether by providing financial backing to sustain you for a set period or a quiet, removed place to work. Grants aren’t loans. You don’t have to repay them. They’re not free money either. The application process can be rigorous, the competition steep.  Institutions provide funding only to the best and brightest candidates on the assumption that you’ll put any assistance to good use.

How do you know if you’re ready to apply for a grant? The answer to this lies in the clarity of your vision. Finding your artistic self can take time, sometimes years, and is an important component to forging the path ahead. If you’re still figuring out who you are as an artist, it’s important not to get ahead of yourself. It may be tempting to use this time to try new things, but going into the grant process with a clear idea of what it is you want to create will maximize your potential output and reflect well on you in the eyes of your supporters. Start off by doing research into organizations that might be a good fit for what you want to do. Once you’ve put in due diligence, you can move on to the application process.

Many grants require a list of references or letters of recommendation as part of the application process. This is where it pays to keep in friendly contact with former instructors. As a courtesy, you should always let references know before you list them. If it’s been a while since you’ve been in contact with an instructor, send an email reminding them which of their classes you took and outlining some of your academic achievements within the context of each course. This brief refresher will make it easier for them to write a letter on your behalf or talk you up to grant committee representatives.

When you’re ready to write your proposal, be sure to read the application carefully. Each organization will have its own unique set of requirements, and putting your application package together incorrectly could put you out of the running on a technicality. It’s a good idea to customize your application to the organization. Vague, canned responses will read as such. Instead, give specific examples of how your work aligns with the spirit of the institution that will be providing support. Lots of foundations and non-profits will fund an artist or entrepreneur based on an idea alone. If the application requires you to submit examples of previous work, try to showcase projects that relate in some way to your request for assistance.

Much like a job application, a grant proposal should communicate your personal essence and artistic aim in a concise, semi-formal way. Avoid language that’s either overly conversational or too elevated. You goal should be to describe your work as clearly as possible. Keep it simple. Check all materials for spelling and grammar errors. If neither of those things is your strong suit, have someone else look over your application before you submit it.

If you’re lucky enough to receive assistance, congratulations! It’s good form to write a thank you note to your references as well as the organization that granted you funding. Perhaps the most important thing to remember is this: obtaining a grant means you’re on the right track. It means someone believes in you enough to back your work. That’s huge.

If you don’t receive funding the first time around, keep applying. Grant committees can (and often do) change from year to year, and with these changes come shifts in the types of projects review panels are looking to fund. Your proposal might get turned down one year and accepted another. Widening your pool of submissions improves your odds of getting funded, so consider submitting to as many organizations as you can. Don’t get discouraged. You now have experience with applying for grants, which is more than you had when you started.

Who’s ready for Spring Break?

Whether you’ve got awesome travel plans, are heading back home, or are just hanging around campus for the week, we’ve got a few suggestions for how to have a fulfilling few days away from school.

Reach out to potential employers. Career Development Advisor Tony Mardini suggests that students nearing graduation call studios or companies they’re interested in interning or working at to find out who they should send their resume to. “Have a script ready. It just needs to be a couple of sentences,” says Tony. “Something like, ‘Good morning, my name is Tony and I’m about to graduate from Full Sail. I’m calling to find out who I should send my resume to for applying for an internship.’” Tony suggests reaching out to 3-5 studios or companies – it will be motivating to know people are interested in seeing your resume.

See a movie. A few of the new releases in theaters now include Captain America: The Winter Soldier (which several Full Sail grads worked on), Transcendence, Oculus, The Grand Budapest Hotel, and Noah.

Volunteer Your Time. Helping out a nonprofit organization is an easy, rewarding way to make your resume more impressive and earn GPS points. Kari Ramirez in Full Sail’s Professional Development department suggests checking the Community Volunteer Opportunities page on Connect, which provides information on both local and national organizations in need of volunteers.

Play a game. Settle in for a gaming marathon with one of the popular recent releases like Titanfall, Dark Souls II, or Infamous: Second Son.

Revamp your social media sites. Spring Break is a good time to start making sure your social media accounts are appropriate for a professional environment, says Career Development Advisor Jess Pollak. “Make sure you’re following the up and comers in your industry and you’re interacting with them as well,” she says. Jess also suggests getting on LinkedIn and connecting with grads from your degree program who are currently working in the industry. “A lot of Full Sail grads are willing to help other grads,” she says. “It’s all about getting in touch and networking with them.”

Go to a show. If you’re staying near campus for Spring Break, artists stopping by Orlando include Manchester Orchestra (April 19, House of Blues Orlando), Cloud Nothings (April 21, The Social), and Tycho (April 25, The Beacham). If you’re elsewhere, you can see what concerts are happening in your hometown on pollstar.com.

Catch up on sleep. Don’t forget to get some rest, so you can come back from break the week after next ready to conquer all of your coursework.

Any other ideas? Tell us about them in the comments below!

Singer/songwriter Andy Grammer came to campus this April to play an intimate concert at our performing arts venue Full Sail Live. Andy has released the full-length album Andy Grammer and follow-up EP Crazy Beautiful, with the singles “Keep Your Head Up” and “Fine By Me” hitting Billboard’s Hot 100 chart.

A select group of tickets were given out to the public, as well as students and staff, who were treated to a six-song acoustic set that included his latest release, “Back Home.” Andy followed his last song with a meet and greet, where he signed autographs, posed for pictures, and spoke with fans.

The concert was sponsored by local radio station Mix 105.1, who interviewed Andy before the show about his visit, performance, and new music. Students from our Show Production program were also on hand to help produce the event alongside Full Sail staff.