Best of CASE District VII Award
 

Institution: University of California, Davis

Title of entry: From Labs to Lives Campaign

About this entry: When federally funded research came under threat in 2025, UC Davis recognized the need for a coordinated institutional response. As a leading public research university, we sought not only to defend federal investment in science but to clearly demonstrate its everyday impact on people, communities and the economy. Strategic Communications launched the From Labs to Lives campaign to unify messaging across the entire university under one clear banner: “Real research. Real people. Real impact.”

What began as a video platform for researchers evolved intoa comprehensive storytelling ecosystem: a campaign website filled with testimonials, breakthrough stories, statistics, a research quiz and clear avenues for advocacy. We developed a universitywide toolkit to empower communicators across all colleges, campuses and professional schools to amplify the message in a consistent way.

On Oct. 25, 2025, we organized the first UC Davis-wide media “takeover” aligning messaging across 24 units and owned digital channels in a coordinated 24-hour activation. By year’s end, the campaign generated more than 500,000 impressions and became a defined institutional platform for articulating the public value of research.

Collectively, these stories and resources have offered our own campus leaders, faculty and staff real stories they can share with people they might be meeting with, internally or externally. They have helped policymakers better understand and appreciate the partnership between the federal government and research universities. By the end of 2025, the From Labs to Lives campaign had gained over a half million impressions.