Video for Educational Institutions

We leverage the power of film to help you connect to the people that matter in a deeply human way, making them feel, give, act, change, and mobilize. Because people are inspired by stories about people. Educational institutions need to communicate to a wide array of people – students, parents, faculty, alumni, donors. They want to highlight their purpose; what gets their students, faculty, and staff out of bed each morning and why the audience should want to be a part of that purpose.

Videos for organizations like universities and colleges are the best way to spread a message on a continuous and infinite level, while transcending the static of a newsletter or brochure. From new student admissions films to alumni appreciation campaigns, we use video to show off the people and stories at your educational institution that make it a unique and vibrant campus. We hope you’ll be moved by some of the inspiring videos we’ve made for colleges and universities.

Tribe & Cornell College: Making the Unfamiliar Exciting

Cornell College has a unique curriculum: their classes are a block schedule rather than semester. Potential applicants and their parents are wary of something unfamiliar. Plus, the College is small and perceived to be in the middle of nowhere. What to do? In a series of six videos, we focus on how immersed students are in their learning, how the college provides a myriad of off-campus courses around the world, and prepares its graduates to hit the ground running as they go on to graduate school and their careers. This is the centerpiece:

Educational Video Can Recruit, Engage & Inspire

Networking giant Cisco says video will account for 84% of all internet traffic this year. So, it’s important to find the balance between quantity and quality to send messages about your college or university. Luckily, there are many stories about an academic institution that are conveyed well on camera. Great footage shot on campus can show prospective students (and their parents) what the campus culture and daily life is really like.

Capture the excitement of your student body, and the innovation of your research programs. You can also include student and administrator interviews to create emotional connection and inspire viewers to apply to your program, donate to your campaign, and celebrate your achievements along with you. Video ensures your message is clear and accessible when your on-camera leaders set the right tone and the production team does the rest.

Tribe & Scripps College: Reinvigorating Fundraising with a New Message

Scripps College was launching a new donation campaign. So we had women from across the campus tell us what donations will do for their education. The theme “We Want More” captures the larger impact of an academic fundraiser. That money will strengthen the academic programs as well as the lifelong impact that Scripps College has on its community. The video captures the breadth of diversity in the college as well as how it affects both students and faculty via quick portraits switching one to the next, against a simple black backdrop. The focus is the people of Scripps, and how donors’ choice to pay it forward helps the college do the same.

Share Your Organization’s Story on Camera

Video gives your institution an excellent opportunity to share why you are different, and why that matters. From a unique curriculum to new campus additions, every college or university needs to market their advantages to prospective students. Showcase excellent achievements in research or outstanding faculty with video. Or celebrate your institution’s history on-camera.

Videos that boast the long-term impact an educational institution has made on its students, community, nation, and the world excite people. You can use video to honor famous alumni or to introduce current members of your institution who are ready to make their own contributions to the world.

Tribe & Hamilton College: Framing the Past as Future

We carefully selected passages from annalist letters to shape the content of this film. Woven together with stories and remarks about life at Hamilton today, this piece illuminated how the college has changed and yet stayed the same over 200 years. We shot in winter, spring and at commencement, using high-definition cameras, time lapse, and a mini-copter for aerials, to capture the spectacular beauty and remoteness of their campus. This marketing video helped the college present themselves as an established legacy with a bright future.

Video Highlights Fundamental Values of Campus Culture

Institutions and organizations today are expected to utilize digital video and social media. Millennials, and Gen Z even more so, watch video content almost exclusively on their phones, spending hours each day scrolling through social media feeds.

Build your online presence with meaningful and visually-engaging video content. There’s something to be said for comfort and attraction to things that are familiar. Video accessible on digital platforms in short, digestible clips lets prospective students feel like they understand who you are as an institution because of the consistent presence of videos about your organization on their feed.

This is another place where tailoring video to the audience you’re trying to reach is key in your video project being successful. Millennials and Gen Z are attracted to candid shots, personal stories, emotionally-engaging scores, and highlights about the fun (read: non-academic) things that happen on your campus. The better you can put a spotlight on these things with your video, the more your audience will want to be a part of your university or college.

Tribe’s academic clients have harnessed the power of video to tell stories about their athletic achievements, scientific innovations, historic milestones, and countless excellent students. When videos about a college or university are short and straightforward, they are easily shareable on social media. With a personal touch, your educational institution can share your culture and values with large audiences and reach an even wider audience than ever before.

Tribe & Washington University in St. Louis: Making Marketing Modular

In addition to a main launch film that integrates experiences across schools and graduate and undergraduate programs, Tribe produced a series of modules that personify how Washington University in St. Louis and its students impact the world. This particular video reflects the University’s continued support for its faculty’s ground-breaking research, and student involvement in cutting-edge projects. It’s exciting, meant to inspire and drive people towards the university by evoking the recognition of values in the institution that the viewers see in themselves.

Tribe’s Track Record & Videos for Educational Institutions

As a team of writers, filmmakers and producers who have a passion for creating award-winning, engaging and inspiring video content for corporations, educational institutions, pharmaceutical companies, and more, we invest in each of our partnerships. Universities and colleges need individual solutions to video marketing that capture the mission and the essence of their campus and its academics, and the Tribe Pictures team uniquely understands how to create videos that are more than marketing, but get your organization tangible results, nonetheless.
Tribe’s campaign films have helped educational institutions raise over $8.6 billion.

  • Washington and Lee University – $542 million Echoes of the Past, Voices of the Future
  • Lafayette College – $400 million Live Connected Lead Change
  • University of Connecticut – $600 million Our University. Our Moment
  • Illinois Wesleyan University – $125 million Transforming Lives
  • Princeton University – $2 billion Aspire
  • Washington University in St. Louis – $2.2 billion Leading Together
  • Agnes Scott College – $100 million The Greatness Before Us
  • Kenyon College – $230 million We Are Kenyon
  • NYU School of Law – $400 million Where We Stand
  • Scripps College – $175 million
  • Swarthmore College – $200 million The Meaning of Swarthmore
  • Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center – $125 million Sustaining the Miracle
  • Gettysburg College – $100 million The Unfinished Work
  • Amherst College – $270 million Terras Irradient
  • Dartmouth College – $569 million Mentors
  • Kenyon College – $125 million Claiming Our Place
  • NYU School of Law – $450 million Lead the Way
  • Yale Divinity School – $40 million
Merck Merck logo
American Express American Express logo
KPMG KPMG logo
UBS UBS logo
Quest Diagnostics Quest Diagnostics logo
BD BD logo
Northwood Northwood Logo
Stanley Black and Decker Stanley Black and Decker logo
Colgate Palmolive Colgate Palmolive logo

Every company is different and has unique needs. We offer a wide variety of videos to answer any communication challenge. These are our specialties:

Brand Identity

Brand videos communicate who you are, what you do and why you do it.

Investor Relations

To engage your investors we’ll turn prose into pictures and ideas into images.

Employee Engagement

CEO messages, employee profiles, vision and value videos – we mobilize your Tribe.

Environmental, Social & Governance

Videos designed to communicate and reinforce corporate commitment to key social issues.

HR & Recruitment

In a competitive job market, our videos will help you hire the best and keep them.

Mergers & Acquisitions

As work environments change, videos inspire employees to move in the same direction.

Meet Our Chief Storyteller

Vern Oakley is a veteran filmmaker, teacher, speaker, and industry thought leader. Vern’s mission is to help institutions and business leaders authentically connect to and mobilize their tribes by crafting great stories that speak to the people who matter most.

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“It’s one thing to understand the role of video in business communication, it’s another to know how to use video to solve actual business problems. Vern Oakley gets that.”

LEADERSHIP COMMUNICATIONS CONSULTANT

When you work with Tribe, you’ll get…