WSU Tech embraces Ivanka Trump ad campaign a month after campus speech controversy
A month after canceling an Ivanka Trump speech got Wichita State University’s president called on the carpet, WSU’s technical school is embracing a national program in which the presidential daughter is telling workers displaced by the COVID pandemic to “Find Something New.”
WSU Tech President Sheree Utash serves with Trump on a White House panel seeking to promote technical and job training opportunities. Utash explained the new national ad campaign to the Sedgwick County Commission on Wednesday.
Trump, daughter of and special advisor to President Trump, is one of three high-profile spokespersons for Find Something New, along with Apple CEO Tim Cook and former IBM CEO Ginni Rometti, Utash said.
She said the goal of the Find Something New program is to try to accelerate vocational training and help displaced workers quickly find jobs in the mid- and post-COVID economy.
“This is a campaign we are involved in and actually WSU Tech is highlighted as one of the institutions within this,” Utash said. “This is a nationwide campaign and you will start seeing these ads not only on the web site, but you’ll start seeing the ads on TV, so now you’ll know where they came from.”
The campaign drew immediate fire on social media with critics calling it a tone-deaf response to people affected by the loss of millions of jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic, which has been marked by business shutdowns, layoffs and furloughs.
The campaign also comes only a month after WSU President Jay Golden pulled an Ivanka Trump speech from WSU Tech’s online commencement ceremony.
That action sparked controversy among donors and prompted a major donor and former state regent to call for Golden to be fired.
Golden’s supporters rallied online and in the parking lot at WSU to try to save his job.
Golden survived the controversy and stayed on as WSU president, after a hastily called four-hour special closed session of the Board of Regents.
Utash said “there’s no correlation” between the new ad campaign and the earlier campus controversy.
“I don’t anticipate it to be any problem whatsoever,” she said.
“The great thing about the Find Something New is that it is laser-focused on upskilling and reskiling the American People for future employment,” she said, “developing a talent pipeline, creating short-term certifications so those that find themselves in a situation that they do need to upskill and reskill are able to do that and get back to the workforce as soon as possible.”
Of Ivanka Trump, Utash said “she’s intent on doing the best thing for the American workforce.”
The ad campaign to promote technical education has been in the works for 15 month, but was retooled to be more relevant amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Utash said.
“We decided to kind of realign our marketing messages, so we have come up with Find Something New,” Utash said.
This story was originally published July 15, 2020 at 7:01 PM.
