COSIDA CHANGEMAKER INNOVATION AWARD RELEASE
BEVERLY, Mass. – Several members from the Endicott Athletic Communications Department, Office of Admissions, and Audio Visual Services have been recognized by the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) with the organization's inaugural ChangeMaker Innovation Award.
Endicott was one of three schools to win the award joining Middlebury College and Mississippi State as inaugural recipients of the newly-created CoSIDA ChangeMaker Innovation Award.
Members from all three Endicott staffs who were recognized for the award include Shawn Medeiros (Sports Information Director), George Chapell '08 (Men's Volleyball Head Coach/Assistant SID), Anthony Rinaldi '19 M'21 (former SID Graduate Assistant), Sean Quirk (Associate Athletic Director/Admission Liaison), Chris Lipscomb '17 M'18 (former Senior Assistant Director of Admissions), and Thomas Majkut '08 (AV Systems Manager).
Established in the spring of 2021, the CoSIDA ChangeMaker Innovation Award was created to recognize individual members or staffs who have created and managed innovative content during the current academic year.
The purpose is to recognize forward-thinkers who bring new ideas to life — and strengthen the position of SIDs and their work — with special content, a branding and messaging campaign, new storyteller packages, social media initiatives, a digital series, etc.
CoSIDA's contest was open to any current CoSIDA individual member or team of college athletics communications professionals. If they collaborated on an initiative with department or campus/conference colleagues, the initiative had to include at least one current CoSIDA member who was integral to the project.
The initiative created by all three departments was an Office of Admissions Zoom series that targeted student-athletes in the classes of 2021 (December) and 2022 (January). With no on-campus visits possible during COVID-19, all three departments were tasked with the creation of each Zoom, which included breakout rooms for more than 21 sports — including club sports — and the operations, logistics, & marketing plans for both Zooms prior to, during, and post when they happened.
Additionally, the SID staff created an enhanced marketing strategy before, during, and after those sessions to bolster Endicott's strategy in publicizing the full NCAA Division III student-athlete experience for recruits as they researched attending Endicott. All coaches shared stories that were featured on the Endicott Experience website as well as unique recruiting pages and a "Why Endicott?" page as part of their recruiting strategies.
Nearly 600 prospective student-athletes and family members attended the Zooms.
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(Photo Credit - CoSIDA)
