Blog
Taking Control of Your Time: Work Life Balance
Working at the Corps helps students learn how to balance their life and manage their time effectively. Balancing it All What do you value most in your life? To most people, their life at work comes before anything else. I’m usually very aware of what I need to get done each day, maybe even to a […]
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How Creative Thinking Drives Professional Success
Everyone can be creative! Here’s how it can apply in the workplace.
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Becoming a Well-Rounded Professional
Have you recently challenged yourself in a professional way? If not, it might be something for you to consider. In the workplace, it can feel far too easy to fall into a rhythm and stay in your comfort zone. This isn’t inherently bad, but taking the easy way out means you won’t become as marketable as […]
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Soft Skills Will Change Your Workplace
The workplace is filled with many challenges, such as troubling co-workers, communication issues, and even the struggle of work-life balance. The Digital Corps discusses these challenges in a series of weekly meetings otherwise known as Soft Skills. Theforage.com describes soft skills as, “non-technical skills that reflect your communication style, work ethic, and work style.” Soft […]
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The “Tiktokification” of Social Media
Same Old, Same Old Social media is an ever-changing and evolving landscape as new platforms emerge and gain popularity. Initially, Instagram was known for sharing photos, Twitter for sharing thoughts using words and hashtags, and Snapchat was a way to communicate with friends through photos. These days, the top social media platforms seem to be […]
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Let’s Talk: Building Workplace Community
Nearly every job description I have come across, from customer service to internships to corporate jobs, have all had some basic qualification along the lines of “Effective written and verbal communications skills.” While this expectation has never driven me away from an application, I know that others might find it daunting. While written communication often […]
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Introspective Initiative: Introverts in Leadership Positions
I never saw myself as a leader, but then I started landing leadership positions. I was more surprised than anyone each time I landed another one. When I started working at the Digital Corps in 2020, I was nervous to talk to people because I was just one introverted graduate assistant trying to connect with […]
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Dev Team: Past First Glance
If someone told you they love to do art, you might assume that they’re handy with a paintbrush or pencil. It may never occur to you that their medium isn’t a sketchpad or canvas, but actually, coding. Here at the Digital Corps, our Development Team is responsible for turning content into websites and applications through […]
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Coordinating the Corps, One Project Manager at a Time
At any given moment in time, the Digital Corps is handling dozens of projects that range from building websites to producing videos. While we have a great team of staff to guide us through the process, it’s nearly impossible to expect them to remember every detail of every individual student’s progress. That’s where our Project […]
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Lessons From Corps Seniors
We’re inching towards the end of the semester when seniors are preparing to graduate and fly out of the college nest and go off on their own. Now that Portfolio Day has officially passed us by, it’s full speed ahead for seniors here at the Corps! Once they leave, they will step out into the […]
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Degree Diversity at the Corps
Have you ever walked by the Digital Corps office and wondered what it takes to work here? The Corps works on numerous projects, so when we get applications, we look for unique skills. Our team is made up of students from a range of disciplines, from the humanities to computer science. A Learning Process Some […]
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The Minds behind Design: Creativity on the Design Team
Last year, the Digital Corps held our annual Portfolio Day event online with both Zoom and Miro board elements. We divided the students between two Miro boards where they added their portfolio materials—their résumés, business cards, sample work, and websites—and a Zoom link, so students, staff, and alumni could network. I remember jumping onto the […]
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Meet the Digital Corps Staff
When Ball State University tour guides walk past the Digital Corps, they talk about our student workers and what kind of work they do for the University. While it is true that our students do innovative, creative work, they are supported by our seven full-time staff members who give them the tools and resources they […]
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Social Media Management: A Look at the Corps and the Industry
The History of Social Media “Social media allows big companies to act small again” – Jay Baer The birth of social media came in 1997 with the creation of the social media site, Six Degrees, by Andrew Weinreich. This was followed by the creation of MySpace, which lead to Facebook, and the list goes on. The birth of modern social media came in the early […]
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Fall 2021: Rise of the New Hires
The Digital Corps office is packed with a bunch of buzzing new hires this semester as we’ve opened back up to a fully in-person work environment. For many of the Fall 2021 new hires, this semester is a new experience with new challenges. For some students, the workload hasn’t been that intense, but for others, time management has been a big skill to develop. Adding an extra 15 hours of in-office […]
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Remote vs. Office: The New Debate
The age-old debate between remote and in-office work has taken a new turn in the wake of the global COVID-19 pandemic. Businesses and organizations around the world have realized that they do not need to be in-person to function, while others have learned that they struggle without physical interaction. Here at the Digital Corps, students and staff have […]
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2021 Summer in Review
Here at the Digital Corps, we never stop working. Although our summer employee list tends to decrease a little bit, we still work hard throughout the summer months to produce high-quality content for our Ball State University partners. Our teams worked tirelessly this summer on each project that came through our doors. From animation-heavy videos to thorough UX testing, our summer student […]
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Portfolio Day Goes Digital: Hosting a Remote Conference
Stiff slacks, sticky nametags, and glazed donuts—all hallmarks of the Digital Corps’ annual professional development conference, Portfolio Day. Each year, students don their blazers and dress shoes and fill Ball State University’s Letterman Lobby, lined with tables for a day of networking and showcasing industry portfolios. Thinking back to my first Portfolio Day, I remember the buzz of excitement and amazement from students, staff, and former Corps members. From […]
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Discovering Our Strengths: The Digital Corps’ Experience with CliftonStrengths
One of our seven Digital Corps values is bringing students with different skillsets together in an interdisciplinary workplace. The staff and students encourage each other to exercise their personal strengths. In an effort to bring Corps students closer to their strengths, they turned to the Father of Strengths Psychology himself, Don Clifton, and his unique ideas about how […]
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Work-From-Home Video: Production During a Pandemic
Just over a year ago, I walked out of a movie theater feeling immersed in culture and art after thoroughly enjoying the Best Picture-nominated Jojo Rabbit. With eyes still adjusting to the outside reality and the taste of butter-saturated popcorn clinging to my tongue, I didn’t know it would be my last theater experience for a long time.
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Connection during COVID
Walking freely around the office. Stopping by other employees to chat about projects. Visiting the office to eat lunch and see friends. This was the Digital Corps’ work environment before COVID-19 protocols when students worked 15 to 20 hours a week in the office on campus. We not only prided ourselves on our work ethic, but we […]
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Video as a Medium: A Look Inside One of Today’s Most Complex Creative Platforms
Whether it be scrolling through TikTok, seeing the latest Avengers movie, or watching the evening news, video is incorporated into almost every aspect of our daily lives. It’s hard to believe that video hasn’t been around for very long with the amount of prominence it holds in today’s society. In fact, the first television broadcast took place in 1928, not even a century ago.
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TikTok Takeover
From sports teams and popular restaurants to news outlets and freelancers (and even small agencies like us), people everywhere are taking advantage of TikTok’s opportunity for creativity to market themselves or their organization.
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Keeping Up to Date: How the Digital Corps is Utilizing New Technology to Stay Connected
For many individuals, working from home became a “new normal” because of the global COVID-19 pandemic. Working from home brought new distractions, feelings of isolation, and a lack of productivity.
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The Happy Secret to Better Work: A Digital Corps Discussion
Where is the happiness we associate with hard work and success? Do we keep working hard and meeting goals only to have a short burst of happiness, or do we hold the power to rewire our positivity and ultimately change how we view the world and, in conjunction, our work? This exact idea was recently tested by a group of Digital Corps students and staff who sat down to discuss this idea of “better work.”
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Quarantine Motivation: A Digital Corps-antine Diaries Update
The Digital Corps began shifting towards remote work in early March. As employees adapted to working from home, students of the Corps began to develop project ideas that could be completed remotely. The Digital Corps-antine Diaries, which were developed at the beginning of quarantine, have encouraged Corps employees to pursue creative projects independently throughout this […]
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Movin’ On Up: Advancements and Promotions in the Workplace
Where Do You Start? There is no question that navigating the workforce is stressful. Before you get the job, there’s that anxious waiting period, countless interviews, and then another anxious waiting period to hear if you were offered a position. Talking about the process of advancement can be taboo in the office, like how to […]
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In Review: Portfolio Day 2022
It has been a long-standing tradition at the Digital Corps to have a Portfolio Day in the spring of each school year. However, because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Portfolio Day has looked a little different the past few years. In 2020, the Corps did not even have a Portfolio Day (let’s just not talk about […]
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