5X’s Center for Student Involvement recently received the Best Poster Award from the Consortium for Student Retention Data Exchange for its poster on student retention through the FLASHperks program.
The winning poster, designed by senior visual communications design major Nicholas Blanchard through the center’s Signum Design, details how the FLASHperks program works and how the program benefits Kent State students.
“I designed the poster to fit into the archetype of typical academic posters," Blanchard says. "If it stood out too much, it would lose validity as a higher education informational and conversational piece. However, I still wouldn’t let it be completely without life.”
The center’s Associate Director Katie Goldring, who presented the poster at the consortium's 12th Annual National Symposium on Student Retention in Norfolk, Virginia, says she was pleased with the poster and how it was received.
“We knew that we had a great program that engages students in a new and inventive way,” Goldring says. “We’re very proud of FLASHperks, and we’re incredibly honored to get the chance to represent it at the symposium.”
Kristan Dolan, the assistant director of marketing for the Center for Student Involvement and the Kent Student Center, was in charge of acquiring the data for the poster. She says that it was nice to receive such enthusiastic support and praise for the six-year-old program.
“It was a gratifying moment for FLASHperks and for the university,” Dolan says. “While we know that it’s an outstanding program at Kent State, it’s always nice to be validated by institutional peers who realize that we’re doing great things here.”
For more information about the Consortium for Student Retention Data Exchange and its Best Practices in Student Retention awards, visit .
For more information about the FLASHperks Reward Program, visit .