Jack Cassedy is a young alum with a wonderful career that seems to have little connection with his degree; after close inspection, however, it is obvious that Jack’s journey and destination are codependent
by Paul Martell
Jack Cassedy is a 2011 grad with an exciting future!
It is common for students to struggle with which major to select. It has become the norm to try to mold our dreams into something that reflects our existing skillset. Jack Cassedy knew what he wanted out of life, but he was not afraid to extend himself to new possibilities, and is now well on his way to living his dream. Jack Cassedy plans to, one day, better the world in a tangible way.
“I’ve always felt like I really wanted to make a difference in the world and help people in some way, so I thought that being a doctor would be the best way to do that, which led me to major in Biology,” said Jack. He would not end up a doctor, not yet anyway, but he would graduate from EMU with a Bachelor of Science, majoring in biology and minoring in political science. Today, Jack is the Director of Internet Marketing at Prudential Snyder & Company, Realtors. From athletics, to a fraternity, to Student Organizations, to internships; Jack’s journey is what has put him on track toward his dream.
Jack Cassedy loves wrestling, in fact he says, “Wrestling pretty much defines me as a person.” Jack wrestled throughout high school and did very well for himself. He remained totally undefeated until his final match, as a senior, in which he was significantly outweighed by the opponent and lost 9 to 4. Jack said, somewhat jokingly, “I remember that match like it was yesterday…It haunts me.”
It was actually wrestling that brought Jack to Eastern Michigan University. He enrolled because he knew the assistant coach of the wrestling team quite well; they had met at several national tournaments Jack was in when he wrestled for Team Michigan. Jack intended to start his collegiate wrestling career at EMU.
“Young and naive, I thought a little 112 pounder like myself could make it at 125 pounds wrestling in college…Long story short, I started as a sophomore, but didn’t do very well. I was undersized and couldn’t keep my weight up. Which is the opposite of what most wrestlers deal with – cutting weight to be the biggest guy in your weight class.” Jack was also busying himself with getting involved in student life.
Jack loved the transition from high school to college life. He lived in Putnam Hall and said, “It was like being in a city of people my own age…Everything was new and exciting; it was like being a kid again, but with hormones and responsibilities.” Eventually Jack would retire from wrestling and joined the fraternity Kappa Phi Alpha. Jack says that the Fraternity House was in a “bad place” then, and he set himself to help make it better. After some obstacles and opposition, Jack reports that being a part of the Kappa Phi Alpha brotherhood, “taught me valuable leadership skills and organizational skills that have translated to my professional life more.”
Jack (second from right/blue T-shirt) is a proud Kappa Phi Alpha Fraternity Brother
Eventually, Jack became involved with the organization Campus Life, which turned into a marketing internship with Campus Life. This job would set the stage for Jack’s career path. “I was given the task of researching social media marketing, back before everyone was doing it. I researched hundreds of articles looking for valuable insights on how to best use social media for marketing. I turned those insights into a presentation and presented it to several different departments and eventually to the EMU Strategy Council (which was over 100 people at that time)… It was a pretty intimidating audience.” This gave Jack a unique understanding of Social Media Marketing and led him to take another job as a Brand Agent for Neebo.
Jack could see a great career possibility in web marketing and decided to “take my internet marketing chops to the next level” by earning a Master Certificate from the University of San Francisco online. He did this while still an undergrad.
Thanks to this strategic decision, Jack was now able to run valuable social media campaigns, use web analytics, search engine optimization, blogging, and all things web-marketing; all when it was starting to be in great demand.
Jack Cassedy was quickly hired by Prudential Snyder & Company, Realtors after graduating in 2011. He is the Director of Internet Marketing, “I create strategies and implement tactics that improve our overall web presence and increase web generated leads. I manage multiple social media accounts, implement search engine optimization strategies, blog, and consult the real estate agents on social marketing, how to utilize the tech tools that the company offers, as well as helping them to implement third party marketing systems.”
But how does a major in biology help someone in web marketing? Jack finds unique and meaningful ways in which his education has made him excellent at his job:
“Earning my Biology degree has been invaluable to my career path. The hours upon hours upon hours spent doing research projects for Biology related courses has helped me to turn anything I want to learn into a research project; in essence, this has shaped the process of how I learn new things… And in the business of internet marketing, there is always something new to learn. Chemistry, which is a mixture of math, puzzle solving, and applying rules to situations has helped me to understand complex virtual ecosystems in a way that allows me to leverage each piece in a way that makes the most sense for the overall strategy.”
Jack’s ambitions are not fulfilled yet. Jack says, “My future will be filled with lots of stress, sweat, coffee, and ambition put to work. I want to change the world for the better.”
Jack plans to create a free, web-based educational product that is significantly tailored for the “visual web”. This is how Jack will better the world, through education that is available to everyone. “If every single person on the planet is able to get a world class education in a manner that is easy to understand and stay engaged with; humanity will be able to move forward much more quickly.”
While Jack’s path was unconventional, he is going directly towards his dream. Jack believes his collective experience at EMU has greatly contributed to the success he has today.
Jack wants to, “change the world for the better.” He already is.
If you want to know more about what Jack has been up to, like his Living in Ann Arbor Facebook page and remember to follow the Prudential Snyder Twitter!
Jack (bottom) also loves his “Pit bull Pooch” Ollie (Top)
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