The first Australian university degree in advertising was offered 50 years ago and the industry is celebrating.
While television advertising in Australia began soon after the first regular broadcasts in 1956, it took until 1974 before QUT offered a course on the industry and another 16 years before a second university added it to its offerings.
In a competition celebrating five decades of advertising graduates, QUT alumni won four of the five categories, a testament to the Brisbane university’s legacy in the field.
Professor Gayle Kerr, a leading academic in advertising at QUT, was recognised as the outstanding graduate for the first decade of advertising education between 1974 and 1983.
“I enjoyed working in the advertising industry as a copywriter for more than a decade,” Professor Kerr said.
“One of the best campaigns I worked on was for Tourism Queensland featuring Jacki McDonald from Hey Hey It’s Saturday!”
Professor Kerr said when she shifted to academia she didn’t really leave the industry.
“Instead I discovered that there was more than one way to use research, creativity and insight to persuade the customer to buy into the experience.”
Professor Kerr said technology had always transformed the industry, with QUT always at the forefront of the advertising education field.
“QUT introduced the first advertising degree in Australia. 16 years ahead of the rest. Then the first advertising postgraduate course. The first IMC program. And even the first digital advertising unit. This innovation has always been driven by technology, but perhaps even more importantly, it has ignited the passion for learning within our industry.”
As advertising education continued to adapt, so did QUT graduates, as evidenced by Rem Bruijn, the Creative Director of Brainheart, who was recognised as the outstanding graduate in the second decade of advertising education between 1984 and 1993.
“I actually enrolled in a Bachelor of Business Communications to study journalism, but discovered advertising and quickly changed lanes,” Mr Bruijn said.
Fellow QUT graduates Justine Armour and Matthew Moran took out the honours for the periods from 1994 to 2003 and 2014-2023 respectively.
Ms Amour said since Ieaving QUT in 1998 her life and career had been a wild adventure from Brisbane to Sydney to Portland to New York.
“Becoming a creative and then creative leader at some of the best agencies in the world took hard work, commitment, and great mentors, but none of it would have happened without the foundation of learning and support I had as a young person,” she said.
Mr Moran is the Global Head of Strategy for NEXT and said even after a decade of life after QUT he still carried his experiences and learnings with him every day.
“My favorite campaign I worked on would have to be PLAY NZ from Tourism New Zealand.”
“In the middle of Covid while borders were closed, we invited the world to PLAY NZ online via a gameplay walkthrough.”
Professor Kerr said she was thrilled QUT graduates were being celebrated as outstanding industry leaders.
“I always knew we produced amazing graduates at QUT but to also have the endorsement of some of the leading thinkers in the industry just makes it official,” she said.
