Public Adult Education of MA: Live to Learn

Client: Adult & Community Learning Services (ACLS)

The Context

ACLS approached us to do a campaign to make them relevant and top of mind for adult education across MA.

Our research showed that access to adult education is foundational for Massachusetts residents. ACLS exists to make it possible for anyone in Massachusetts — no matter who they are or their life story — to pursue an education and develop their professional capabilities and connections. While this work should be celebrated, the lack of a strong unified brand, for both ACLS as well as public adult education as a whole, makes it more difficult to reach prospective students, expand capacity, and recruit the best educators into the field. And in the absence of a brand, ignorance and existing biases can keep the public from recognizing the unique value that public adult education brings for Massachusetts’ economy and way of life.

Our task was clear:

1. Build a brand for public adult education in Massachusetts—and establish ACLS as its steward

2. Increase perceived value of Adult Basic Education, no cost adult education programs.

3. Generate excitement in potential and current educators and students

4. Expand the conversation about education to counter bias and change minds

When we began our engagement, ACLS had a tenuous brand relationship with the partners and providers that create the student experience. They provided funding and set standards, but from the perspective of stakeholders, their role was often unclear. That holds even for programs that they run directly, such as MassLinks and MassSTEP, which make little or no mention of their connection with ACLS in their branding or communications.

This wasn’t surprising. In the way they presented themselves, them and their partners bring different priorities and perspectives to the table. That made it difficult to frame what they do along common, shared lines.

And the story gets more complicated when we talk about ABE as a system. With ACLS and partner programs focused on their own concerns and priorities, there was little effort to present a collective image of a No-Cost Public Adult Education System, how it relates to the student experience, and ultimately, why it exists.

The Approach

We decided to flip the story. We started the conversation with the adult education system—ACLS’s reason for being—and closely associated it with the student experience. The idea is that when people hear about the no-cost public adult education, they think first of the value and experience it delivers to students, and not as much about individual programs or a state bureaucracy. In this model, ACLS becomes not just a funder and administrator of the adult education system, but a steward and promoter. You carry the vision, articulate the value, and represent the field both internally and externally. For all intents and purposes, and for all audiences, ACLS is the adult education system in Massachusetts.

Our approach: Building a unified, student-centric brand for no-cost public adult education, with ACLS as its steward and promoter. Making it clear to all that ACLS speaks for adult education in Massachusetts—and for the value that it creates for students, stakeholders, and the whole community.

Building a Brand

We started with an interactive brand excercise with the client to understand who ACLS is and what the adult education system really has to offer.

From this, we crafted a brand identity:

With this information, we crafted the brand position which later became the brand tagline:

To live & learn. For those striving or a better future, public adult education is the bridge between living and learning. Our programs provide students without high school degrees or with limited English proficiency with the skills, support, and credentials they need to further their education, seize opportunities, and build the lives they want to lead.

Bringing the Brand to Life

With a brand identity to build on, our next step was to unify all the programs and partnerships that make up the brand experience.

The unifying concept needs to address the mechanics of and relationships between ACLS funded internal programs and partnerships. And the goal is to draw a clear connection between all of them in a way that strengthens their unique value in the eyes of the target audiences. That’s what we call a brand architecture.

And the best brand architectures are based not on roganizational charts but on the brand strategy and the audience experience you are aiming to create. That’s why we proposed organizing all Public Adult Education initiatives and relationships around the brand position—to live and learn.

Bridging living and learning is about takin the time to understand adult learners’ lived realities as well as their goals and dreams. And it’s about connecting them to no-cost opportunities that will help them work towards turning those dreams into reality. Public Adult Education of MA meets learners where they are; and ACLS is there to support every step o the way.

Our brand architecture defined each component of the Public Adult Education of MA system, first and foremost, by answering the question: how does this program bridge living and learning? At the highest structural level, we distinguished between programs at the learner level and at the system level.

• Programs at the learner level meet adult learners where they are. Think: services that help learners achieve their goals

• Programs at the system level build the infrastructure that helps adult learners achieve their goals and create the life they aspire to live. Think: services and partnerships that set standards and maximize efficiency and reach

Brand in Action

Agency: Argus