A Virtual Community of Support for Teens

Every 29 seconds another student gives up on school, which translates to more than one million students dropping out every year, according to The Urban Institute. As an extension of their ongoing High School Dropout Prevention campaign, the Ad Council and the U.S. Army launched a new series of PSAs in November. The traditional ads, along with a new array of interactive media strategies, are designed to give at-risk teens throughout the country the “boost” they need to stay in school and graduate.

Created by JWT New York, the new TV , radio, print, outdoor and Internet PSAs feature ten at-risk high school seniors, the “Class of ’08,” documenting their struggles to stay in school. The PSAs direct audiences to visit www.BoostUp.org to give a virtual boost to these teens and find out how to support the teens in their lives.

In an effort to extend the reach of this effort and provide more opportunities for at-risk teens to get a “boost,” the campaign is now also integrating the most popular social networking and user-generated content sites, as well as mobile messaging. Through MySpace, Facebook and YouTube, users have increased opportunities to give members of the “Class of ’08” a “boost.” The campaign is also building a community of support for all teens, allowing users to send a message via e-mail and text messaging to any teen in need.

BoostUp.org has been redesigned to serve as a hub, facilitating conversations and aggregating support, in addition to serving as a resource for both parents and teens. All of these elements work together to encourage peer discussion about the importance of a high school diploma.

Since its launch in 2000, the campaign has received more than $400 million in donated media support and provided countless teens with the encouragement they need to stay in school. Please continue your generous support of this critical effort and help students throughout the country get the boost they need.

New Nutrition Education Campaign

In an effort to promote healthier lifestyles, the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA ) Food Nutrition and Consumer Services and the Ad Council have launched a campaign to encourage parents to provide healthy options for their families and to motivate their children to seek a healthy balance of proper nutrition and amounts of physical activity. Approximately two-thirds of adult Americans are overweight or obese, and nearly 17% of children and adolescents are overweight. Research indicates that being overweight during childhood and adolescence is associated with being overweight during adulthood. Created pro bono by Saatchi and Saatchi, the Nutrition Education PSAs aim to inspire parents to encourage healthy habits by emphasizing that “good nutrition can lead to great things” for their children. The campaign places an emphasis on reaching low-income families, who tend to be at greater risk for overweight and obesity.

In addition, the Ad Council and USDA partnered with Walt Disney Home Entertainment Studios on a series of PSAs featuring the lovable characters and songs from Walt Disney’s classic The Jungle Book. These new spots, available for television, radio, outdoor and Internet media, highlight for kids and families the importance of balancing good nutrition and physical activity by emphasizing that a healthy lifestyle can help them be the best at everything they love to do.

The PSAs were distributed to media outlets in December. They direct audiences to the USDA ’s www.MyPyramid.gov website for fun interactive tools to help guide healthy choices.

April is Autism Awareness Month

As you prepare for your station’s programming in April, we hope you remember that April is Autism Awareness month.

The Ad Council and Autism Speaks, with the creative excellence of BBDO , have put together a wonderful campaign that includes television, radio, print and Internet advertising. The ads aim to motivate parents and caregivers of children aged six and under to learn the signs of autism. The ads also tell parents “you know the odds of autism, now learn the signs.” The PSAs contrast the odds of many things that parents think about each day—such as the dreams they have for their children and the measures they take to protect them—with the startling odds of a child being diagnosed with autism, which are now 1 in 150, according to the Center for Disease Control (CDC ) release in February 2007.

Audiences are directed to visit the website www.autismspeaks.org to learn the signs of autism and to find out about early intervention. The ads initially launched last year and are available at www.psacentral.org.

Ad Council Honors Merkley + Partners

The Ad Council has presented its 2007 Gold Bell for Creative Excellence to ad agency Merkley + Partners during its 54th Annual Public Service Award Dinner at the Waldorf- Astoria Hotel in New York City. The dinner, honoring Richard D. Parsons of Time Warner, was hosted by NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams, and served as a tribute to the industries and individuals who support the Ad Council and its public service advertising campaigns.

Merkley + Partners was recognized for its outstanding work on the Ad Council’s Online Sexual Exploitation campaign.

The PSAs direct teen girls to “Think Before You Post” and ask viewers and listeners to visit www.cybertipline.com to get tips on how to prevent, detect and report suspicious online behavior. The agency was selected from among 40 volunteer agencies that create PSAs for the Ad Council.

Giving Kids the World We Want Them to Live In

The Ad Council and Earth Share are launching a new TV PSA designed to illustrate the human consequences of environmental neglect, and offer Earth Share as a simple way to care for the home we all share. The PSA dramatizes the impact that environmental neglect is having on our health and natural resources and motivates people to get involved in protecting the environment now. Created pro bono by Draftfcb Chicago, the Earth Share PSA again features the voiceover work of actor and conservationist Harrison Ford.

Haunting images of a polluted and abused environment blanket a young girl’s bedroom walls as she calls viewers to action: “You promised me the world — is this what you had in mind?” As part of the Environmental Involvement campaign, Earth Share’s new PSA stresses the importance of caring for environmental health to ensure preservation of natural resources and the highest quality of life for all people. Earth Share supports hundreds of the country’s most respected local, national and international environmental and conservation nonprofits in workplace giving campaigns across the country, and its website offers links to its member groups, environmental news, resources, volunteer opportunities and much more.

We urge our media partners to support our Environmental Involvement PSAs (available for radio, print and Web) throughout the year and during April, Earth Month, to inspire people to get involved with one simple way to help improve the environment we live in and make it better for future generations.

Urging Hispanic Adults to Adopt Children in Foster Care

In an effort to encourage the adoption of Hispanic children currently in foster care, the Ad Council, in its ongoing partnership with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Administration for Children and Families (ACF) and the Collaboration to AdoptUsKids, launched new PSAs designed to encourage Spanishspeaking families and individuals to consider adoption from the U.S. foster care system.

According to the ACF, approximately 300,000 children in the United States enter the foster care system each year. Each year, more than 24,000 of these children “age out” of the system without ever having been placed with permanent, loving families to support them in the transition to adulthood. The majority of children in foster care are of color; 15% of the children waiting to be adopted are Hispanic. Created pro bono by ad agency Revolución, the new PSAs highlight the emotional and psychological rewards of adoption through foster care by showcasing everyday yet special family moments. The new multimedia campaign includes Spanish television, radio and print PSAs, and issues a national call-to-action for parents to adopt children. The campaign emphasizes the message that families or individuals can achieve a sense of fulfillment by adopting a child through foster care. The PSAs end with the poignant message, “Complete a Life. Complete Your Own.”

The PSAs direct audiences to visit www.adopte1.org or call 1-877-ADOPTE1 (1-877-236-7831) for more information on how to become an adoptive parent.

Make Wildfires Disappear — Not Forests

After almost 40,000 acres and hundreds of homes were burned in California mainly due to humancaused wildfires, the Ad Council is strongly encouraging our media partners to incorporate our Wildfire Prevention campaign into their Earth Day promotions. Wildfires remain one of the nation’s most critical issues.

The principal factors contributing to human-caused wildfires are leaving camp fires unattended, burning trash on windy days, carelessly discarding smoking materials and BBQ coals, and operating equipment without spark arrestors. Our PSA campaign is a great way to educate parents and children about the importance of safety and responsibility when it comes to preventing wildfires.

We hope you will support these efforts to educate Americans about the importance of wildfire prevention by airing our PSAs not just during April for Earth Day, but throughout the year.

The Impact We’re Making Together