Our goal was to build an emotional connection with educators by recognizing that the work they do every day doesn’t just make students smarter — it changes lives. We focused on delivering this powerful truth during Teacher Appreciation Week, a time when the educational world turns its attention to teachers, but often without the authenticity or deeper acknowledgment they deserve.
As with all the work New Honor Society does in collaboration with Microsoft Education, we wanted to demonstrate our deep understanding of the teaching experience. In this case, we wanted to honor and be true to the subtle, life-changing moments educators create beyond the academic curriculum. And, we needed to do it in way that held up a mirror for everyone to see themselves — from teachers and staff to students and parents.
Insight: While teachers are often evaluated against test scores or graduations, the true magic lies in the small, nearly invisible moments that shape students’ lives.
Brand Truth: Microsoft supports teachers with incredible tools that allow them to spend less time on mundane tasks and more time truly connecting with their students.
Idea: Commemorate the intimate, transformative events that change student’s lives by turning a school into a museum of memorial-worthy moments.
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Drawing from real educator experiences and themes, the New Honor Society team created “micro-memorials” that distilled the emotional truths of the classroom experience into timeless tributes. Each moment was enshrined as if it was a historical landmark: from a student discovering the unique power in her dyslexia, to a class learning the value of critical thinking. Inspired by authentic stories we’ve heard in our ongoing work with Microsoft Education—we treated these stories with reverence and permanence, reframing how people view the important work of teachers everywhere.
We centered the work around a short film shared on Microsoft Education’s social channels on Teacher Appreciation Day—a tribute designed to resonate deeply with teachers and the students they’ve impacted. While the hero video was the centerpiece, we also developed extensions to keep the conversation going during the entire week, inviting our audience to share their own moments that we’d enshrine for them.
The biggest challenge we faced was honoring the profound emotional weight of teachers’ everyday contributions—on a lean production budget of $5,135. Rather than viewing this as a limitation, it pushed us to be resourceful in intentional ways.
This work stands out not just for what we included, but for what we chose to leave out. We chose not to use on-camera talent or voiceover, instead relying on sound design, art direction, and provocative framing to tell our story. We leaned into restraint—letting sound, texture, and stillness create a sense of intimacy and nostalgia that honored teachers with quiet power.
The response to our work affirmed what we hoped: this wasn’t just content—it was connection. Educators didn’t just watch, they felt seen. They shared it with colleagues, reposted it in school forums, and used it as a reflection point in classrooms and communities. The campaign became a conversation—one that extended far beyond Teacher Appreciation Week.
With a total reach of 95.5K impressions and over 74K video views across platforms (all organic without paid support), the work clearly resonated deeply. Perhaps most importantly, we saw teachers and educational professionals engage with the content. The 1.5K engagements generated resulted in an average 1.85% engagement rate (27% above the multi-channel ER benchmark) and an average 1.07% clickthrough rate (129% above the multi-channel CTR benchmark).
