My junior and senior year at Elon University, I had the honor of serving as the agency director of our student-run PR and advertising agency, Live Oak Communications.

At the time, Live Oak supported 5 local businesses in the Alamance County area where we got to witness our work make real impacts. We saw our creative go out into the world, achieve measurable results, and even win some awards along the way.

As an agency affiliated with a university, we had additional perks professional agencies didn't get. Our office was free, we didn't have to pay salaries, and we received outside funding beyond what our clients paid us. That led us to ask, "how can we pay this forward?" The answer was our Rooted in Community initiative.

In Fall of 2025, we made a pledge to support at least one non-profit or cause-centered business at an accommodating price to ensure we continued to give back to our community.

In just 3 months, we took a concept and turned it into an integrated part of our organization.