HIU's Short Film Wins Educational Advertising Award

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With great excitement, we announce that Hartford International University’s short film Spirit of the Stacks won a bronze award in the 38th Annual Educational Advertising Awards under the category of Special Video.

These awards go to “those entrants whose programs and materials display exceptional quality, creativity and message effectiveness.”

“We wanted to present HIU in a very unique way to promote Theological Libraries Month,” said Chief Creative Officer Steven Havira. “As the month falls in October, the story of a student working on a research paper and then having to source a book from the HIU stacks lended itself to a spooky premise.”

Steven Havira, the director and editor of the film, said he was inspired by 1930s monster movies and "The Twilight Zone." 

Several HIU staff were involved in the production of the black-and-white short film. The actors were Liz Ryan, Communications Coordinator as the “student” and Professor Emerita Miriam Therese Winter as the “Spirit of HIU.” Joe Chung, Events Coordinator and Continuing and Professional Education Manager, was the producer. 

 “I'm glad to have worked with our Communications team on the project which also served as a learning experience for storytelling and media production,” Steven said. 

We thank Karla Grafton, Director of Library Services, and Marie Rovero, Library Acquisitions & Interlibrary Loans, for collaborating during the filming. 

“At HIU we are always trying to be a unique and creative institution; being able to produce a short film PSA for our historic library is what makes this place so special," Steven said.     

Congratulations to all the participants!

If you haven’t watched our short film yet, find it here.