with Steve Pratt, Author of the hit book Earn It
with Steve Pratt, Author of the hit book Earn It
CASE STUDY
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BCIT has built its reputation by preparing students for meaningful careers through applied education. But like many post-secondary institutions, it faced a familiar communications challenge.
Prospective students don’t connect with institutions because of course catalogs, rankings or program descriptions.
They connect with people.
BCIT wanted to showcase the resilience, determination and transformation that define its community, but needed a format capable of telling those stories with greater depth than traditional marketing channels allowed.
Rather than creating another institutional podcast, BCIT wanted to build something that reflected its values while inspiring current students, alumni and future learners.
Fireweed features guests from in and around the Cascadia Innovation Corridor, interviewing academics and industry leaders, people from business and tech who are working to create resilient systems — all built to handle change. Meet people with vastly different experiences who have demonstrated their ability to grow and adapt to whatever challenges life throws at them and — like the fireweed — come back stronger than ever.
Before production began, JAR worked with BCIT to define the podcast’s Job, Audience and Result.
Inspire lifelong learning by sharing authentic stories of resilience, reinvention and personal growth.
The podcast wasn’t designed to promote BCIT’s programs.
It was designed to demonstrate what education can make possible.
The series was created for prospective students, current learners, alumni and anyone considering a new direction in life or career.
These listeners weren’t searching for admissions information.
They were searching for possibility.
Success meant strengthening BCIT’s brand by creating an emotional connection with audiences through stories that reflected the institution’s values and purpose.
Once the Job, Audience and Result were established, every editorial decision became more focused, from guest selection and story structure to pacing and production.
Together, JAR and BCIT created Fireweed, a podcast inspired by the resilient wildflower that thrives after disruption, becoming a metaphor for personal growth, reinvention and lifelong learning.
Each episode explored the experiences of students, alumni, faculty and community members whose journeys reflected BCIT’s mission. Rather than focusing on academic programs or institutional achievements, the podcast highlighted the human stories behind education, showing how learning often becomes the catalyst for meaningful personal and professional transformation.
JAR partnered with BCIT throughout the production process, including:
Every editorial decision was guided by one question:
Would this story inspire someone to believe change is possible?
BCIT already had extraordinary stories.
The challenge wasn’t finding inspiring people.
It was creating a platform where those stories could resonate beyond the classroom.
The JAR System shifted the focus away from promoting the institution and toward celebrating the people whose lives had been shaped by it. Instead of asking how the podcast could explain what BCIT offers, it asked how each episode could help listeners imagine what their own future might look like.
That shift influenced everything from the guests and storytelling style to the pacing, tone and emotional arc of every episode.
The result was a podcast that strengthened BCIT’s reputation not through marketing claims, but through authentic human experience.
The JAR System transformed Fireweed from an institutional podcast into a storytelling platform about resilience, growth and lifelong learning.
| Before | After applying the JAR System |
|---|---|
| Promote BCIT programs | Tell stories about lives transformed through learning |
| Share institutional achievements | Celebrate resilience, curiosity and personal growth |
| Speak to prospective students | Inspire anyone considering change |
| Build awareness | Build emotional connection and belonging |
| Market education | Demonstrate the impact education can have on people’s lives |
People rarely connect with institutions.
They connect with people whose stories help them imagine a different future.
BCIT already had thousands of remarkable stories within its community. The opportunity was to organize those stories around a single purpose: demonstrating how education changes lives.
By defining the podcast’s job before production began, the JAR System transformed institutional storytelling into something audiences could see themselves inside. The result was a podcast that strengthened BCIT’s reputation not by explaining its programs, but by showing the human impact those programs create.
Episodes achieved an average 98% listener-through rate, demonstrating exceptional audience attention and emotional engagement.
The podcast doubled its listenership, increasing its audience by 100% while expanding BCIT’s reach beyond traditional institutional communications.
Fireweed became an ongoing storytelling platform that reinforced BCIT’s values through authentic human experiences rather than institutional messaging.
Each episode became a lasting content asset that continued inspiring prospective students, alumni and lifelong learners while supporting recruitment, advancement and brand storytelling.
