Award reflects EMU’s commitment to providing a transformative and accessible education
EMU’s financial aid notification packet has a new look, and people are starting to notice.
The packet of information, mailed to every admitted undergraduate student with a FAFSA on file at EMU, simplifies the often complicated financial aid process by outlining the total aid offered and the costs students will be expected to cover. It includes information on grants, scholarships, and loans, as well as direct and indirect costs of an education at EMU.
Once a drab bundle of letters and forms, the financial aid notification packet has been delightfully redesigned through a collaboration between EMU’s marketing and communications department and Farmville, Virginia-based marketing agency Letterpress Communications.
The new-and-improved “FAN packet” features the design of a sunrise over the familiar Massanutten Mountain ridgeline and bright, attention-grabbing colors. It also uses friendly, approachable typefaces with bold, easy-to-read text. Each packet comes with a set of EMU-branded stickers, perfect for laptops, phone cases, water bottles, and notebooks.
It’s anything but ordinary, reflecting EMU’s unique and diverse campus, its commitment to providing a transformative and accessible education, and the care it puts into supporting students and families through the financial aid process.
“This project was all about transparency, organization, and user-focused design: helping students and families navigate an important decision with confidence,” reads a Facebook post from Letterpress Communications.
EMU’s marketing and communications department teamed up with Farmville-based Letterpress Communications to design its reimagined financial aid notification packet.
Best of Show
Representatives from the marketing agency attended the Southwest Virginia American Advertising Awards in Abingdon, Virginia, on Feb. 28. There, EMU’s FAN packet won a Gold ADDY, a top honor in the advertising industry, as well as the Best of Show award, recognizing it as the best overall piece in the competition.
It will now compete at the district level against Gold ADDY winners from Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. If the FAN packet wins gold at the district level (winners are announced in April), it will advance to the national competition in June.
“This is truly terrific news,” said Braydon Hoover ’11, MAOL ’21, vice president of enrollment and marketing. “For the nearly 1,000 students and families who have already received the FAN packet, this award demonstrates just how special the financial aid process is here at EMU.”
“We are committed to doing everything we can to make the financial aid process as simple and understandable as possible,” said Troy Martin, director of financial aid for EMU. “The next step, if you’ve received a FAN packet and haven’t done so already, is to review it with your family and your admissions counselor.”
For more information about your financial aid notification, visit emu.edu/fan.
Join the Discussion on “EMU’s financial aid notification packet crowned Best of Show at competition”