WASHINGTON—The United Negro College Fund has put a spin on its memorable tagline, “A Mind is a Terrible Thing to Waste,” to stress the importance of investing in a college education for young African-Americans.
At an event at the Department of Education on Friday, UNCF President Dr. Michael Lomax introduced the “Better Futures” campaign, which features the new tagline “A Mind is a Terrible Thing to Waste, But a Wonderful Thing to Invest In” and new public service advertisements, to an intimate room of higher education leaders and advocates, including Chancellor of D.C. Public Schools Kaya Henderson, former UNCF executive director Vernon Jordan and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.
The new campaign was created in partnership with the Ad agency Y&R and the nonprofit Ad Council, the team that created the original “A Mind is …” campaign in 1972 with Jordan. Lomax described the new campaign as “a call to action” to “ensure that our young people have the education they need to step up and be a part of a global economy that is tougher than ever before.”
UNCF introduced five 30-second PSAs that featured real college and high school students from across the country. One video featured a student, Sidney, who asks the public to think of investing in a child’s education like a stock.
“Not the kind of stock that’s about making money,” she said, “but a stock for social change. When you invest, it helps kids go to college. My name is Sidney, and I’m your dividend.”
Another video, for example, showed a student named David, who grew up in the housing projects of Cleveland.
