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I was giddy as a school girl when I spotted the answer to these ads. Luckily it was so early in the morning and there were few vehicles on the road because I made my husband reverse the car to get the picture.

Ontario Colleges? I guess that explains why we haven’t been seeing these ads outside Ontario. I couldn’t have been more pleased that it was an educational institution behind this campaign (not like when I found out that the pigs were a part of the Telus campaign)

Another thing that really struck me was the perfect relevance of the message. It’s audience? Millennials (Generation Y) and, of course, their parents.

So what?

Recently a lot of research has come to surface that explains a big difference b/w Gen Y and Gen X – their parents. The influence, input and control Gen Y parents have greatly outweigh that of Gen X parents. Gen Y parents do a lot for their kids and really take part in the bigger decisions they make. One example of how this has played out is the significant decrease in kids getting driver’s licenses. Research shows that a large part of it is due to parental influence. One can only expect this behavior to spill into other big decisions, such as their college education.

But won’t parents influence kids to go to college? Sure they will. But can parents influence their kids to do well? Not so much; they don’t have that kind of control.

What I’m getting at is that if kids have more input and say into their college decisions they are more likely to succeed. If YOU make the choice you know it’s something you want, right? What’s really important here? Getting an education is not about becoming a doctor or lawyer. Education, in any field and at any school, is what’s important.

In the end, this ad is about trust. Putting trust where there is none. Empowering a Generation that keeps getting harped on for being lazy. Only good thing can come from this.

Update: More ads revealed here