Dakota Lynne Beard is a photographer, social media manager, lifestyle and travel blogger, and student at Washington State University Vancouver. After graduating high school, she chose to take a gap year to explore the opportunities available to her in the creative world. With a strong interest in photography, she embraced the time outside of school to advance her skills in photography, social media, and professional media.
Through her time away from school, she was able to work as an intern for Build + Bloom, a photography nonprofit as Director of Operations, managing sponsorships, workshops, and speaking engagements throughout the country in addition to social media and photography duties. Her time spent here allowed her to fully discover how much of a treasure it is to serve others with creative talents. In addition to this, she worked with models, clients, and businesses to advance her own photography business and better her skills.
Through this and her own photography business, Dakota was drawn to continue her studies in Digital Technology and Culture at WSU Vancouver, where she is working to better her skills in social media, design, and marketing. This unique Bachelor’s program at WSU allows her to further effective practices in social media marketing, multimedia authoring, and media theory. In addition to this, Dakota is minoring in Communications which will advance her journalism and media authoring skills in real-world situations. While studying, Dakota also currently works as a social media manager for Oak and Melanin, a social branding and design agency where she is able to apply these skills and more in service to helping small businesses elevate their online profiles through marketing and creative direction.
Through Washington State University, Dakota has chosen to study abroad in the summer quarter of 2019, which serves as a perfect place for this honorable scholarship to be applied. Studying strategic communication in real-life social media situations in Greece, she will be working with small businesses to learn how to effectively market and promote multimedia campaign materials. Dakota has been greatly benefited by this scholarship in this instance and it will effectively help her achieve her academic goals on a higher and more accelerated level.
Dakota is honored and privileged to be a part of Honors Society and represent such a defined and hard working group of people.
