East Tennessee State University professor Marty Fitzgerald recently won six awards at the Tri-Cities Metro Advertising Federation ADDY awards competition.
Fitzgerald, a third-year assistant professor of digital media, entered two pieces in the competition – a video created for the ETSU Faculty Convocation ceremony and Inside Buc Sports.
Fitzgerald’s convocation video earned him four awards, he said, including a gold award for the video’s musical composition, a silver award for “self promotion,” and a Mosaic Award for his representation of diversity. Fitzgerald also received one of three Judge’s Choice Awards for the music featured in the video.
“The pieces for the university [the convocation video] were a little groundbreaking for us because they were all in HD, high-definition,” Fitzgerald said.
In addition to the awards he received for the convocation video, Fitzgerald received gold and silver awards for the music and graphics he created for Inside Buc Sports.
Although Fitzgerald has entered the competition for two years now, he says that it’s not something he necessarily plans on. Each year, Fitzgerald waits to see if any of his work is suitable to compete for an ADDY, he said.
“Some things go in an art contest or somewhere else – they wouldn’t fit in the ADDY awards at all,” Fitzgerald said. “The ADDY awards are for advertising pieces and advertising campaigns.”
If he has any appropriate pieces in commercial and advertising, he’ll enter the competition again next year, Fitzgerald said.
In the meantime, Fitzgerald said he thinks the ADDY awards have the potential to bring more awareness to the digital media program at ETSU.
What about attracting new students to the program?
“It’d be nice if it did,” Fitzgerald said. “I think the students see the work, and if the work is something they like, that would attract them.”
All of the pieces that earned a gold award will now advance for competition in the district-level ADDY awards.

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