One of the most reliable ways our marketing and communications team uncovers strong stories is through the relationships we have built with faculty and campus partners across Valparaiso University. Regular meetings, informal check-ins, and collaborative work on things like program pages, admissions materials, and research highlights create natural opportunities for people across campus to share what is happening in their classrooms, offices, and programs. Those conversations are frequently where the best stories begin.
Campus partners play a particularly important role in this process because of how broadly they engage with students. From admissions counselors who first connect with prospective students to academic advisors, career services professionals, student life staff, and faculty mentors who walk alongside students through graduation and beyond, these relationships span the entire student journey. That range of perspective means our team has access to stories at every stage, from the moment a student first considers Valpo to the experiences that shape who they become by the time they leave.
There is also a trust dimension to this approach that matters. When faculty and campus partners see the marketing team as genuinely invested in their work, they tend to reach out on their own when something meaningful happens, whether that is a student research breakthrough, an emerging interdisciplinary project, or a transformational advising relationship. The relationships do a lot of the sourcing work for us.
Taking time to understand each college’s and department’s priorities also sharpens our ability to recognize story potential early, sometimes while a project or experience is still unfolding rather than after the fact.
The close-knit nature of Valpo’s campus reinforces all of this. A hallway conversation, a quick exchange at a campus event, or a side discussion during a planning meeting often surfaces the most authentic leads, the kind that speak to mentorship, hands-on learning, and genuine student transformation.
Collectively, these relationships and touchpoints give our team a consistent, grounded way to find and tell stories that reflect what the Valpo experience actually looks like, across every stage of a student’s journey.
