For the first time ever, Newhouse creative advertising students entered the Sports Clios and Entertainment Clios competitions and won big. Clios are regarded as some of the hardest awards for creative advertising students to win.
At the New York City Clio Sports Award Show in December 2024, the student team comprised of art director Jack Wojtowicz and copywriter Micaela Kraker won three Clio Sports Awards: two Bronze Awards and one Shortlist Award. They won for their campaign “One Eagles Nation” for Duolingo.
The student team comprised of art director Meiling Xiong and copywriter Maggie Mallon won a Silver Clio Entertainment Award for their campaign “Real Housewives of Duolingo” at the Los Angeles Entertainment Clio Award Show in November 2024.
The awarded campaigns were created in professor of practice ’s Portfolio III course, the culminating course for at the Newhouse School, where students learn to create conceptually strong, integrated campaigns using mediums including emerging technologies, digital, outdoor and experiential.
The Clio Sports Awards celebrate the best in global sports advertising. Only five winners worldwide were selected in the student category, and“One Eagles Nation”was one of them, earning a Bronze Award. It also won a second Bronze in the student category, where only eight winners were recognized globally. Additionally, it won a Shortlist Award in the category, among only three winners worldwide.
View the Bronze Award-winning campaign in a two-minute case study video: “.”
Print ad for “One Eagles Nation” ad campaign
Through their research, Wojtowicz and Kraker found that Philadelphia football fans are fiercely passionate, but with 34% living outside the U.S., their chants don’t always reach the Philly stadium. The students’ campaign uses Duolingo’s platform to connect international Eagles fans with those in Philadelphia.
To bring this concept to life, they started with the idea of Eagles Ambassadors. Eagles fans who are in America will download Duolingo, and the most active learners on the app will be chosen as Eagles Ambassadors. As part of the campaign, Eagles bars will be set up around the world, and the Eagles Ambassadors will livestream directly from the stadium tailgates to these Eagles bars.
For the first time ever, Eagles fans around the world will virtually tailgate in the parking lot of Lincoln Financial Field. Using their Duolingo skills, Eagles Ambassadors will initiate chants back and forth between people in the stadium and people in the Eagles bars in other countries, so that the fans can share their love for the favorite team.
As they chant, automatic captions will be generated so the fans can fully understand one another. This will allow people in major cities like Berlin, London and Paris to get the full Philly experience. The Eagles Ambassadors will also ensure that fans around the world get a chance to chant on the Jumbotron at the Lincoln Financial Stadium. To generate local buzz, the “One Eagles Nation” campaign includes putting posters around Philadelphia, spreading the word with cheeky messaging. Wojtowicz and Kraker also created a series of three print ads featuring similar messaging.
“The best ideas combine two things that don’t initially seem like they’d fit together…like Philadelphia Eagles fandom and learning a foreign language. But the creative team found the sweet spot where those two elements intersect and the result is an idea you never saw coming,” says Wojtowicz and Kraker’s creative mentor, Bruce Jacobson ’92, group creative director at VML and Newhouse creative advertising alumnus, when praising their idea.
How did the students manage to get such an accomplished mentor during their time in Portfolio III? For the class, White, using her industry connections, created a mentorship program to pair each student creative team with an award-winning creative director from a top ad agency.
In Portfolio III, White gives each student creative team weekly one-on-one feedback to help them push their ideas further. Concurrently, student teams meet with their industry mentor typically three to five times during the semester, which also helps them elevate their ideas.
The Clio Entertainment Awards celebrate excellence in entertainment advertising. Xiong and Mallon’s “Real Housewives of Duolingo” campaign made its mark at the Entertainment Clio Awards, winning a Silver Clio in the category. This team was announced as just one of 11 winners in this category.
View the Silver Award-winning campaign in a two-minute case study video: “.”
A fiery collaboration betweenDuolingoandBravo’s Real Housewives franchise, this campaign brings drama to language learning like never before. Xiong and Mallon realized that learning a new language can sometimes be tedious, even boring, work, especially for busy adults. So, they came up with the perfect remedy to boredom: a spicy collaboration with the Real Housewives reality show and Duolingo to help people learn their new language of choice.
After a one-month streakon Duolingo, users connect their accounts to the Peacock streaming service, select the language they’re learning, and watch anyReal Housewives episode with subtitles in that language. The drama unfolds in two parts. First, Duolingo breaks down the reality show’s scenes, teaching grammar and pronunciation. Second, on TikTok, fans recreate legendary scenes in the language they are learning with English subtitles, using the hashtag #RHODL.
Next, the 10 videos that get the most likes on TikTok earn a spot on theHousewives’ reunion episode—but with a twist. The people who created these viral videos will be invited to join the reunion episode in person. At the show, they mustrecite an iconic Real Housewives line in their learned language. Make a mistake? A Housewives cast member delivers the ultimate penalty: a splash of Pinot right to the face.
This campaign taps into Generation Z and millennials’ love for binge-watching reality TV, all to turn language learning from a chore into a must-share experience.
Sam Mazur ‘96, a proud Newhouse creative advertising alumnus and freelance creative director with credits at Wieden+Kennedy, Ogilvy and Terri & Sandy, mentored the duo alongside White to help them bring the heat.
“What better way to get someone interested in learning a language, which can be a difficult and cumbersome process, than by adding something as flavorful as theReal Housewivesto the mix? Tapping into a fandom means truly tapping into culture, and that can be a powerful way to connect an audience to a brand. And they nailed it,” White says.
The creative advertising students’ success in the competition highlights the Newhouse creative advertising program’s ability to develop talent that truly makes an impact, creating work that resonates with experts in the industry who are also judges in these competitions.
This story was written by Molly Egan
