D+ Advantage?

As I sit and quietly reflect on my life, I wonder where I went wrong.  Do I not have the required skills?  Could I improve my cover letters?  Or am I not educated enough?  After all I did go to Drake University, a school that has been repeatedly included in Princeton Review's and US News' best colleges in the midwest (including this year).  It is unfortunate that the positives of Drake seem to be lost, thanks to an interesting decision.

The D+ advertising campaign may provide an answer as to why I am still jobless.

Let me give you some background.  Drake starts with the letter "D" and we live in an age where we don't have time to read words.  The plus sign is something that represents protons, and is associated with positivity.  The marketing folks decided to bring the two ideas together for the D+ campaign.  I know, genius.

The question becomes this: Is it appropriate for an academic institution to pride itself on being known and associated with a D+?  I think the criticisms write themselves.

And they pretty much have.  The campaign has practically gone viral.  Obviously there are posts from The Des Moines Register and other local sources, but even the Washington Post and the Boston Herald have chimed in. 

Of all the sources that have mentioned this story, the source that I was most surprised to hear from was my next door neighbor.  I bumped into him outside yesterday and even he was laughing and joking about my big D+.  (He may find it funny because his son goes to Bradley with their B+ advantage.)

The worst part is the way Drake is handling it.  They are saying that it is ironic and funny.  When other people don't get it there is a snobbish way of putting people down.  That's how I felt when I posted my problems on Drake's facebook page.

At first, the university's facebook operator seemed to put me down saying that I blew a perfect opportunity to spread the good word about Drake.  I don't know how to respond when somebody I barely talk to asks me if I've heard about Drake's D+ program.  The only way I know how to respond is to join in the mockery and say that it was a bad decision.  Then Drake seems to put down the way my neighbor handled it. Tanya had a much better response than me and it is just like my rhetoric classes taught me.  It doesn't matter what the intent of a text was, it is how it is perceived by the public.  This is a rule that should especially apply to marketing departments.

At the end of the day I agree with the guy in the Iowa State shirt in the KCCI video.  "There are a lot of bad ideas that cut through the clutter and really for those guys, this is a bad idea.  They're too good a school for that."

That's what people should know when they see Drake on a resume.  Then they should hire me.