Teaching PR

Team Book Presentations

I reprised my Maymester team book presentation assignment and thought I'd share the results from this year. The assignment divides the class into small groups, each reading different books. I provide discussion questions (available to Teaching PR readers upon request) for four 50-minute small group meetings plus 1-2 hours of class time to prepare presentations. Each team reads one book but learns about three by listening to the other teams.

The teams are required to recap the key concepts from the book and to somehow use social media as part of their presentation.

The first team, which read Groundswell by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff, created a Tumblr with key concepts and relevent links. The second team presented Convergence Culture by Henry Jenkins, and live streamed their presentation -- clever. The third team, which read We the Media by Dan Gillmor, organized their presentation on a Twitter page (!) and even got an @ reply from the author.

The best part was when students in one presentation started pulling in (on the fly) the other books, making connections and demonstrating that they were learning from each other. Watching that is a lot more fun than grading traditional final exams.

Updated collaborative lit review project

A couple of years ago I posted about a collaborative literature review project I used during Maymester; this year I tried it again and made some changes to address some of the issues that came up the first time around.

First of all, I told students that our overall question was, "What do we know about how people interact with social media?" This helped them focus more on scholarly research (though they were allowed to include one newspaper/magazine/trade press article) and eliminated how-to tips and that sort of thing. Next, since the class includes a broad range of majors -- ad/PR, telecomm, consumer journalism, ag communication -- I asked that each student include at least two articles from their own area of academic study, plus two more from another area, such as psychology or computer science. This gave us a broad range of topics and subject areas, which in turn gave us more to organize.

When students uploaded their abstracts to our wiki (I used PBWorks), they organized them mostly around academic fields, so we had topics like "social media and advertising." In class, I gave a brief lecture on information overload and showed a video of Clay Shirky, who argues that the problem is not information overload but filter failure. I then asked the students to reorganize the wiki around overarching categories such as privacy or psychological effects. They needed about 30 minutes to accomplish this. Last, we watched Michael Wesch's video "Information R/evolution," and discussed how our project would change if we used tags rather than categories. 

I thought the project worked better this time and would again recommend it to others. It demonstrates the power of collaboration and has the added bonus of allowing students to practice working on a wiki. I do recommend starting the project off with a trip to the library -- our wonderful mass comm librarian provides a 50-minute presentation on how to search and which databases to start with, along with a helpful reminder that abstracts are copyrighted and cannot simply be cut-and-pasted to the wiki.

Because it's Maymester the students had only 2 days from start to finish; during a regular semester I'd suggest making it a week-long project.

Student blogs for Maymester 2011

• A Girl Should Be Two Things
• A Yankee in Dixieland
• asiarowe: International Documentaries
• Bridesmaid Banter
• Brushwork
• Dating the "Game"
• Dicks Dig the Chick Flick
• marcassimus
• recipeleek
• rojmonahan
• The Technology Blog
• Your Grandma's Dirty Laundry

These are the students who gave me permission to publish the links to their blogs for my social media class during Maymester, 2011.

Meet the Maymester students

I'm teaching a social media class again this Maymester (instead of 15 weeks, it's 3.5 weeks long), and it's a great group with a mixture of Advertising, Consumer Journalism, Mass Media Arts, and Public Relations majors.

I created a Twitter list of students enrolled. Please consider following each one -- there are only 12 13!

A day without water: I tried

Recently I wrote about my plan to go a day without water in support of my students' campaign to raise $5,000 to build a clean water well through charity: water. 

Well, I tried.

First of all, I know that planning ahead by putting a cup of water next to my sink so I could brush my teeth, or making a casserole to be baked that night without a need for water, or making a pitcher of lemonade to drink all day long is NOT the same as living someplace with no access to clean water, ever. 

 
Nonetheless, even with all of these preparations I still couldn't make it through the day. I don't think any of my students did either -- in my case, I was brushing crumbs off the kitchen counter with a hand (no sponge) when I walked over to the sink and rinsed my hand off: D'OH! That was a mistake, but then there were choices: after dinner I realized if I didn't hard boil some eggs there'd be no Easter egg dyeing tomorrow. And since I'd already blown it anyway I might as well rinse off the dishes rather than tempting the ants.

I think one of my students summed it up best when she said that just by trying, even though we failed, we're all more aware of how much we use -- depend on -- clean water. 

Many thanks to Teaching PR readers who donated to the fund. As of now the class has raised $941 (with more in cash from a couple of events not in the fund yet). Oh, and by the way, if you haven't donated yet, just click that last link.

Is yours clean?

I'm teaching a special topics social media class this semester, and I challenged my students to raise money for charity: water. We need $5,000 to build a well in Africa, which will serve an entire village for 20 years.

The class came up with the idea of collecting pledges to go without water for a day on April 22 -- Earth Day. I signed the pledge, and then I started trying to figure out how I could do it. I could sort of cheat by washing dishes, doing laundry, and taking a shower the night before. And, if I flossed and swished I could probably live without brushing my teeth. I could drink lemonade made the day before and I don't drink coffee anyway, so I could get by. I thought about eating in restaurants so dirty dishes wouldn't pile up unrinsed in the sink, but then the restaurant would be using water, so I'd have to prepare cold dishes the day before. No watering plants, not even my daughter's tomato seeds. The students assured me that no one is willing to give up flushing the toilet, so we're exempting that. Heh. Hand sanitizer all the way.

But what about my daughter? Quite frankly, I'm not willing to let her go without. But, watch this:

Jennifer Connelly in charity: water Public Service Announcement from charity: water on Vimeo.

 

Some people have to give water like that to their children every day. It appalls me.

I'm asking you, if you've found value in my blog over the years, or in my friendship, or if you just think this is a good cause, to make a donation to my students' campaign. $20 will give one person water for 20 years, but $5 or $10 will help, too, because 100% of donations go toward building a well (charity: water pays its administrative costs through other means). And, I'll be making a donation proportionate to what my readers give, so the more you give, the more I'll give. 

Mine is clean, and I bet yours is, too. How fortunate we are.

 

Update: links to student posts on charity: water

• Chelsea: Is Yours Clean?
• Brooke: Is Yours Clean?
• hthom77: charity: water and Donations Welcome!
• Lauren: Is Yours Clean?
• Emma: Water Water Everywhere
• Emily: BLUE for charity: water
• UGA PRSSA: Is Yours Clean?
• Sarah: charity: water
• India: Effortless FUNdraising
• Alex: Playlist of the Week
• Elizabeth: charity:water
• Caitlyn: The Water Industry vs. charity: water
• Ashley: Giving Never Goes Out of Style

Spring 2011 student blogs

Here are the links to my spring 2011 social media class student blogs (students listed here all gave me permission to post their links). They're a talented bunch -- be nice and leave 'em a comment or two!

• The World Through My Eyes (photography)
• It's a Colorful World (color and crafts)
• Notes (music)
• Adorn (decorating from the inside out)
• Jam Jive (live music)
• Athens Pianist (piano music)
• Training for the Trail (hiking)
• Nice Ideas (make someone's day)
• Creative Outings (entertainment)
• Especially Eventful (special events)
• Quoteweekly (thought for the day)
• Glamazon Guide (guide to an unglamorous world)
• The Great American College Tour (college towns)
• Bun Voyage (burger reviews)
• Travels and Tunes (music and traveling)
• More Than Billboards (political campaign advertising)
• Cheap and Easy (Athens entertainment)
• Fundraiser Fun (fundraising)

Social media class syllabus

Several people have asked to see the syllabus for the special topic, honors social media class I'm teaching this semester. I removed all the boring junk about office hours and attendance policies, so here's what you really need to know [annotations in brackets]:

Learning objectives

1. Students will become familiar with social media tools and software by reading about, discussing, and using them
2. Students will participate ethically and effectively in social media with an awareness of legal and ethical implications of their use
3. Students will participate in collaborative learning projects, both online and offline, to increase their understanding of crowdsourcing and the social and cultural effects of social media
4. Students will develop professional communication skills while working with charity:water and building a professional online presence

Course requirements and grading

The class emphasizes collaborative and hands-on learning. Each student will be required to:

• Read and participate in class discussions                                                 10%
• Participate in social media
  • Twitter (including paper.li); LinkedIn; +1 by choice                      10%
  • Personal blog                                                                              25%
  • Wikipedia entry                                                                           10%
  • Wiki abstracts for literature review                                              15%

• Contribute to group projects
  • Team book presentation                                                               10%
  • charity:water project (includes peer evaluations)                           20%

Please note that students are required to keep track of their own progress (for example, keep a page that lists all the links you’ve submitted to paper.li via Twitter; note how many followers you already have on Twitter so you know how many you’ve added during the semester; etc.) in order to provide information for end-of-semester reports on social media participation.

Required reading

• Cognitive Surplus, Clay Shirky
• One of the following: [for team book presentations]
  • Groundswell, by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff (ad/PR)
  • Convergence Culture, by Henry Jenkins (TV/entertainment)
  • We the Media, by Dan Gillmor (journalism)
• Web links provided throughout the semester [using Diigo this semester]

************************

The daily schedule got a bit messed up by our weeklong snow adventure (a.k.a. what should've been the first week of class), but generally I'm trying to organize it so that there's a lecture during one 50-minute period, a discussion or small group meetings during the second, and a hands-on activity or guest speaker during the third period of each week. (In part to keep it interesting, in part to make it easy for me to transition it to a Maymester course of 3 hours per day.) I'll post the schedule after I finish modifying it and coordinating guest speakers.

Also, although the class was open to all Grady majors, it turns out that only PR and advertising students registered, so we aren't using Gillmor's book and are having two groups on Groundswell instead.

Assignment experiment: Let students create their own SM projects

• "I have found that Twitter was much more complex and time-consuming than I had expected!"
• "I began my social media project with high expectations."
• "Blogging is not as easy as I expected it to be."

I've written about my Public Relations Campaigns class many times before; it's our capstone course in which students work with real clients to solve real PR problems. During the past few years the student teams have successfully begun to incorporate social media along with more traditional PR strategies and tactics to help their clients communicate with their target publics.

In addition to the team element, I like to include some additional project so that students have an opportunity to demonstrate their individual skills (and to help me sort out who's actually working hard). Years ago I made them take on an additional client -- internship, organization, etc.; more recently I had them participating on PROpenMic with a set of instructions such as friending so many people and writing so many blog posts. Last semester a number of the students complained (on PROpenMic, interestingly enough) about this assignment, asserting that they didn't like to be forced to use one particular site when there might be others they'd be more interesting in trying. One student, whose opinion I respected, even suggested that I let everyone pick their own platforms.

My initial reaction was "That's insane." I imagined myself trying to write up a list of potential platforms and grading criteria for each one, somehow making a Twitter assignment that takes equal work, knowledge and effort as a blog assignment and a video assignment (and so forth), and then going through all of these platforms attempting to grade all of these different projects fairly. 

Upon further reflection, though, I decided I didn't really have to do that. I just asked the students to create their own assignment. During the first week of class, I explained about the past PROpenMic assignment and told them they could use that platform if they chose, but also said that students had suggested letting everyone choose their own platform. I asked them to write a one-page proposal explaining their project and setting measurable objectives for the semester. 

The social media project accounted for 20% of their final grade in the course, and the students not only took it seriously, but thought big. They proposed things like starting a blog about politics "because I don't know anything about politics but know I should." I reviewed their proposals --most students chose blogging or Twitter; a few chose Facebook for organizations-- and spent a little time cutting back on unrealistic expectations (100 blog followers, for instance, or 500 Twitter followers) and giving suggestions as appropriate.

By the time midterm rolled around, many of the students realized that they weren't even going to be able to make these rolled-back objectives, but I asked them to continue and to try new approaches as appropriate. I also tried to help by linking to good blog posts or retweeting student accounts and so forth.

At the end of the semester, I asked students to turn in a 2-page (or so) summary of their initial objectives, steps they took to try to reach their objectives, and what happened in the end. I told them I was more interested in what they learned than in their actual statistics. The result included some of the quotes you see above. Students reported that participating in social media is difficult and time-consuming, requires commitment, and demands passion and focus far beyond what they expected.

Many of the students said they appreciated the assignment and were happy that I made them try something new in social media, although the fact that their grade hinged upon their summary report undoubtedly had something to do with that. Heh.

These kids are slick

This semester I've got three teams and a total of 24 students in PR Campaigns. They've just completed their midterm client presentations, and for the first time ever, all three teams got the go-ahead on pretty much everything they proposed.

This isn't a complete list, but here are some examples of things the teams will be working on in the next month.

• Oconee Hill Cemetery: planning and running a Veteran's Day service next month; collecting information for a National Historic Registry application and researching potential grant applications; updating the website; building partnerships with relevant UGA departments (historical preservation, horticulture).
• Oconee County Library children's section: holding an open house event and building the infrastructure for volunteer recruitment and fundraising; building a database and doing a holiday card/donation mailer; creating a Facebook presence (87% of the respondents in a community survey say they're on Facebook!); planning a spring eco-focused event.
• Athens Nurses Clinic: designed a new logo and collateral materials plus a website; creating a marketing/publicity plan for the clinic's second-ever fundraiser; doing a volunteer satisfaction survey to provide feedback and testimonial information; developing a social media presence targeted at volunteers and donors.

Each team did a great job of basing their recommendations on the research they conducted during the first part of the semester, which made their proposals credible and realistic for each client's abilities and budget. I can't wait to see the results.

Requiring social media participation in classes

A discussion on PROpenMic this week reopened a question that educators have been debating for several years now: should students be required to participate in social media as a class assignment?

Reasons not to require it:

• Using social media means participating in a conversation with transparency and authenticity; can someone be "forced" to do that?
• Students should be using social media anyway, so there's no reason to make it a course requirement
• Requiring social media turns it into a "chore," which is not a good learning experience
• There are no set standards for what "good" participation should be; how can you grade it?
• Students sometimes show poor judgment in what they post, so requiring them to participate puts them in danger of harming their future career options

Reasons to require it:

• Social media are an increasingly important part of public relations practice, and students should practice using it with transparency and authenticity while in school so they are prepared to use it properly on the job
• Using social media personally (hanging out with friends on Facebook) is not the same as using it professionally, so students may not be as well prepared as they think
• Many of the assignments students do in school are "chores" -- would students practice doing surveys or writing news releases if they were not required?
• Teachers can create rubrics to explain how students will be graded, just as they do with other assignments, so that grading will be fair
• Students sometimes demonstrate poor judgment in what they post, so they'd better learn now what is appropriate and what is not; a poor grade or bad experience now is better than getting fired later; and using a closed platform like PROpenMic can help to limit the damage

You all know which side I come down on, since I've been requiring students to participate in various platforms for years now. But what do you think?

Addition: Be sure to read Tiffany Gallicano's important follow-up post on public participation.

International Women's Day: Honoring Project Safe

Today is International Women's Day, so I'm taking an opportunity to interview one of my PR Campaigns class clients, Joan Prittie of Project Safe, a local nonprofit organization that works to end domestic violence through prevention and education, crisis intervention, support services, and advocacy. The Athens Banner-Herald named her one of the top newsmakers for 2009 because domestic violence claimed 10 lives in our small city last year.

Question: You told my students that Project Safe began when some Athens women were brave enough to open their homes to strangers who needed a safe place to stay. Can you tell us what you know about that time?

Joan: Unfortunately I know very little about the early years--before Project Safe officially became Project Safe.  I've met some people who were involved in various ways back in the early 1980s, but I'd love to learn more about our founding mothers (and fathers) and really piece the early history together.

Question: You also said that you've been inspired by the founders' bravery. What do you do to try to live up to the example they set?

Joan: I try to keep moving the organization and the community toward an end to violence.  We push ourselves to do better and do more each day.

Question: During the team's first client meeting, you said that when Project Safe had a little extra money last year, you spent some of it on marketing. I can honestly say I've never had a client tell my students that before. Why did you make that decision? How do marketing and public relations contribute to the success of Project Safe?

Joan: Before I came to Project Safe, when I was practicing law, I worked on a clemency project with 78 battered women who were in prison for killing or harming their abusers.  Only one ever called a hotline, but they all had someone in their lives who knew about the violence.  They got bad advice or no advice at all.  That same pattern is confirmed in studies and--just recently--in the Georgia Domestic Violence Fatality Review Report.  

Victims aren't in touch with advocacy/service providers, but their friends and family are aware of the abuse.  Marketing and outreach is important to help people connect with us.  It's also important for events like our Dancing with Athens Stars fundraiser coming up on March 21st at the Classic Center, or our resale shop, P.S.Too.  Donor trends nation wide are that individual giving and government grants are decreasing, while earned income or entrepreneurship among non-profits is increasing so we want our events and business efforts to be successful. 

Question: What can the rest of us do to help prevent or halt domestic violence?

Joan: Don't be violent for starters.  Teach your children not to commit or condone violence. Talk about it--it's so widespread, and yet people act like it could never happen to them.  Learn about the risks, warning signs and resources the same way you might educate yourself about any other health issue. 

Check out our Web site or our Facebook page for information about domestic violence and resources in the area.  Know that there's a hotline (706-543-3331) available 24 hours a day. Volunteer.  Donate.  Contact Project Safe for an education presentation or training at work, school or church.

PROpenMic Week: If I did it again....

Here's a report to other faculty who might be considering a "PROpenMic Week" assignment like this one.

Overall it went pretty well. My students jumped right in with joining groups (two created new groups), commenting on posts, and (if they didn't already have one) creating profiles. It seemed to me that there was a leap in site participation that week (Robert French: can you confirm this perception?), with lots of new posts on the site; a couple of my students from past semesters also got re-energized about using the site because a lot of their (IRL) friends were friending them or commenting on their old posts. Also, if students from other schools joined that week there would have been lots of activity to engage them. So that's a good thing.

What I thought would be the high point, the joint blogging project with UNC-Wilmington's Dr. Jeanne Persuit's intro class, actually turned out to be the part that needs tweaking. I sent Jeanne a list of my students the week prior to PROpenMic Week, and she matched names with her students and posted a list on the discussion board for our "Seahawks + Bulldogs" discussion group. However, we should've done this sooner, because most students didn't start posting their interviews until Wednesday or Thursday of PROpenMic Week, which left very little time for anyone to comment on these posts. Moreover, the "week" was supposed to end on Friday, but it really ended up being "week-and-a-half" because some of the student pairs didn't finish each other's interviews in time to be posted during the official assignment (Jeanne and I both extended the deadline when we realized what was happening). I think a number of the students enjoyed talking to someone from a different school and at a different point in their education, but the assignments need to be made a least a week before the start of the assignment if you expect them to be part of the week's conversation.

My students are still expected to participate on the site throughout the semester, but I think this assignment can serve as a good introduction for students who aren't familiar with using a social network for professional reasons. I also thinking pairing up with another class makes it more interesting because it seems a little silly to interact primarily with students you already see in class every week. Just use the "Faculty" discussion group on PROpenMic to find a partner.

Celebrating PROpenMic week

The students in my class, PR Campaigns, are celebrating PROpenMic week, today through Friday. They'll be creating blog posts, interacting with Dr. Jeanne Persuit's students at UNC Wilmington, adding friends, joining or creating groups, and commenting on other people's blogs.

Even if you aren't in my class this semester, and even if you aren't a student at the University of Georgia, you're welcome to join us in taking advantage of this great resources for PR students and educators. See you on PROpenMic!

Cross-posted on PROpenMic.

Social media book presentations

Taking a cue from my colleague Kaye Sweetser, and from Richard Bailey's comment about wanting a follow-up post about my book assignment, I've uploaded video of my students' presentations. I'm not including their names because we just did a segment on "stalkers, spam and trolls" so I'm paranoid on their behalf. Thus the videos start rather awkwardly after they've already started talking.

Groundswell (first team)

 

Here are the team's fail videos from this presentation.

Groundswell (second team)

Gatewatching

Convergence Culture

Unfortunately, this one ends before the team presented their Google doc about chapter six, but here's the team's blog from this presentation.

More collaborative learning: reading and presenting social media books

As I have mentioned, my Maymester class is cut out for collaborative learning. Here's my second collaborative project of the semester: I required the students to participate in a group project using books about social media.

I selected three books, and students were allowed to pick which one they wanted to read. The books are

• Groundswell, by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff (ad/PR)
• Gatewatching, by Axel Bruns (journalism)
• Convergence Culture, by Henry Jenkins (entertainment media) 

A large number of students (8 of 13) selected Groundswell, so I divided them into two teams.

I scheduled the reading over four days, two before the weekend and two after, and wrote discussion questions for each book each day (yes, this means I had to read 3 books as they were reading one). I dedicated one 50-minute time slot per day to discussions within the breakout groups. 

Finally, the students are required to do a team presentation of their books to the rest of the class. I asked them to be creative, and if possible to use social media in their presentations. I consulted with each team once to make sure their ideas were appropriate, and I gave them an additional hour today to finalize their presentations, which begin tomorrow. Some teams are making videos and podcasts, one designed a game, and one is doing a mock campaign -- I can't wait to see the results.   

I would be happy to share the discussion questions if anyone wants to see them. Just leave a comment or send me an e-mail.

It's not a lecture, it's a guest lecture

Yesterday David Wescott of the "It's Not a Lecture" blog guest lectured via telephone to my social media class on his assigned topic, "social media is fun." He described his company, APCO Worldwide, and his job, including his interaction with mom bloggers -- building a relationship with a community and addressing long-term issues rather than conducting one-time campaigns. He described his efforts to create messages that resonate with communities, building grassroots support through conversation on big issues like healthcare reform or the environment.

Why is this fun? David listed several reasons: you get to know a community, harness their creativity and add your own, get noticed, use your influence to change how things are done, experience new things, and maybe even get famous. He pointed to several mom bloggers as examples. When I told him that Mir, of Woulda Coulda Shoulda fame, is also going to visit our class, he said that he once sent her some chocolate and added that to his list of reasons social media can be fun.

David also explained his efforts on "The World According to Mom" project as more evidence that social media can be fun. And let's not overlook his video evidence of a real Dawg. Now that's fun.

Collaborative literature review project

Teaching Maymester courses is quite a challenge. My class meets daily for almost 3 hours. Each day represents a week in a typical semester -- 15 days instead of 15 weeks. Although we're in class for the same amount of time, there's obviously a lot less outside time for students to read and work on projects; and, I can't lecture for 3 hours a day every day (leaving aside the fact that no one would want to listen to anyone lecture for 3 hours a day). Course planning in these circumstances requires a little creativity.

Because I'm teaching a class on social media, in the spirit of collaboration I decided to use a lot of collaborative learning techniques and projects. The first of these is a social media literature review project inspired by a project Michael Wesch described on his blog. I made an appointment with our amazing mass comm reference librarian, Kristin Nielsen, and the class met in a library lab for an hour so she could demonstrate search techniques for the project. I also created a free wiki especially for the project on PBworks; while at the lab students went to the "Bibliography" page and registered 5 articles they wanted to read (no repeats allowed).

Over the weekend each student had to read and abstract the articles, posting 150-word abstracts on the wiki's "Abstracts" page. They were allowed to use as a starting point the author's abstract when one was provided, but had to use their own words and make an effort to tie the article to our purposes or things we'd already discussed in class. I also asked them to organize (collaboratively) the abstracts as they went, adding headings and grouping like items together. Because it's a wiki, I can go back to previous iterations to see who did what. I haven't graded them yet but will look at both their individual abstracts and their efforts on the organization of the material.

In class on Monday, the students sat at a seminar table with the wiki projected on a big screen to complete the organization of the 65 articles and then identify major themes that cut across the categories (health, politics, children, etc.) they had created to organize their material. After their discussion I came back into the room and we discussed their themes (such as online identity and bridging the generation gap), and then we listed areas for further research -- the "cool mom" phenomenon (exemplified by moms who friend their kids and their friends on Facebook) stirred a lot of interest. Finally, we considered ways their research could be presented: a video on "cool moms," a scholarly research article, and so forth.

I had several objectives with the project: expose students to academic research on social media, help them learn to locate appropriate research, identify major areas of scholarly interest -- that is, what scholars see as compelling or problematic about social media, require them to use a wiki, and practice collaborative knowledge building. I think we achieved all of these objectives, but if I had it to do again I would take a more hands-on approach in the organization and theme-building stage (in other words, I wouldn't leave the room). I had hoped that they could combine their knowledge to create something new without me telling them "the answer," but most of them have not had a research class yet, making them inexperienced and unprepared to synthesize and extrapolate from the details of what they read to create a bigger picture.

Bearing that in mind, I'd call the project a success, and I'd recommend it to other teachers. Thanks to Dr. Wesch for posting it.

Addition: Read an update on this assignment from 2011.

Meet my social media special topics class

At the last minute my department offered me the opportunity to teach a Maymester course on social media. We meet three hours a day for 15 days -- the equivalent of an entire semester in 3.5 weeks.

I opened up the class to anyone who's taken at least one of the introductory survey classes in the Grady College, and despite the late addition of the course 13 students registered. They have a good mixture of interests and majors, mostly advertising but also magazines and various agricultural/ag comm majors. Unlike my PR students from last semester, they're not complaining that I'm requiring them to participate in social media. Which is a good thing.

So, meet my students:

• @lillyjones    blog: Seen on the Street
• @rcmay    blog: Rebecca May
• @Bom351    blog: William Moore
• @AlysonM3    blog: Service in Athens
• @Lauren_M_Riley    blog: New Rock CD Reviews
• @KateLWooten    blog: Patio Gardens
• @Andreahubard    blog: Discover Athens, Georgia
• @CathryneK    blog: Just A Girl
• @peterwbauman    blog: This Is Awkward, But I Like It
• @thompulliam   blog: Adgadget
• @mrcatchings    blog: The Hustle
• @DallasAnne319   blog: Meatetarian
• @crobcary   blog: The Cary Project

Bert DuMars: corporate PR/marketing and social media

Yesterday Bert DuMars, Vice President E-Business and Interactive Marketing with Newell Rubbermaid, guest lectured for my PR Administration class. I'm not going to give all of his secrets away, but here are his takeaways:

• Social media is HOT & overhyped
• Consumer peer reviews are proven -- everything else is experimental
• Don't forget your goals and objectives
• Social media norms and cultures are constantly shifting
• The true power of social media will happen with ubiquitous integration and connectivity

And here are some links discussed in class:

• Twitterstreams: Bert, SharpieSusan, LindsayLebresco
• Jeremiah Owyang's post on brands that got punk'd
• ABC Nightline story on Twitter, TED talk from Twitter co-founder Evan Williams
• Groundswell
• Forrester Social Technographics ladder, 2007-2008 comparison
• Graco blog and Sharpie blog
• (Addition -- forgot this one): Twitter counter 

Bert emphasized that no one can afford to use only social media, but added that the whole space is full of experimentation as everyone figures out how to use it. He admitted that Newell Rubbermaid employees have made mistakes and explained what the company's doing to prevent problems going forward. Sincere thanks to Bert for sharing his knowledge and experience with the students.

PR Administration book review assignment

Last week I posted a link to my class book review blog. I've gotten a couple of questions about the assignment, so I'm posting it here. The purposes of the assignment are to help students feel more comfortable talking about management; to put PR in a management context; and to develop critical thinking skills. Students are graded on meeting the requirements described below as well as grammar and style. I've graded about a dozen so far, and they're pretty good! Check out the blog to read them.

ADPR 5910 Management Book Review Assignment

1. Select a book on management or leadership, preferably something published in the past 3-5 years (but classics are okay, too). Send a link to a brief description of the book to me for approval. I will be checking to see if the book is relevant to PR/marketing communication and management/leadership; if it makes a substantial contribution to the field; and if it is not already being reviewed by another student.

2. Write a review. Summarize the main points made in the book (approx. 500 words), analyze whether or not you believe the author offers a good approach to management/leadership (such as comparing it to the management theories we’re learning about or pointing out flaws in logic or presentation; maximum 250 words), and explain whether you would recommend it to other PR students (why/not; maximum 250 words). Your review should total 750-1,000 words.

3. Send your review to me any time before Feb. 5 at 12:30 p.m. When I return your review with comments, you can revise it if desired before I post it on the Management Book Reviews blog.

PR campaigns update

After all the great educator discussion on how we teach PR campaigns, I thought I'd better confess it didn't all turn out as planned this semester. Both clients were slow to respond about which items they actually wanted the teams to implement, so neither team got to evaluate results.

Both teams relied a lot on the Web. The Grady alum team designed a new Web site for alums which will include resume uploading, a directory that alums can update themselves, and links to Grady groups on LinkedIn, Facebook and MySpace. The Power Partners Solar team created a great audio slide show using SoundSlide -- a great option for low-budget (and easy) Web content that can also be used at trade shows and expos -- and provided suggestions on a Web site redesign that will make the site more accessible to the average reader. Of course, both teams included other forms of communication with key publics -- creating regional alumni groups, holding plant tours -- as well.

Happily, both team presentations went well, and both clients intend to use much of the content created by the students. I'll link to their work as it gets uploaded.

Lesson for me: if I want the students to be able to implement the campaign, I need some pre-set deadlines for the clients so they know what's expected and when.

Now, to think about PR Administration for spring semester....

A different way to teach PR Campaigns

As an assistant professor, I begged not to teach PR Campaigns. But after several years of teaching the same few courses, I decided to give it a try. At first I was a chicken and used local or university clients but hypothetical campaigns. Then I got a little braver and started taking on bigger accounts. In either instance this involved a semester of work followed by a formal presentation at the end of the semester. And then I launched into the big time of actually implementing the campaigns during the semester. Yes, people, there's a learning curve for teaching, too.

Here's what I've been doing lately:

1. The students meet with the client during the first or second week of class. The client reps explain the basic issues and problems, areas where they'd like help.

2. The students go nuts on research. It varies by client needs, but I try to make sure they get some focus group, interview, and/or survey experience in addition to reviewing past press coverage, locating and analyzing competitors, etc.

3. The students write a situation analysis and prepare a PR plan with goals, objectives, and lists of tactics. The students pitch the client at a formal meeting, explaining their research and why they're recommending the strategies and tactics they selected.

4. The client tells us what they like and don't like, and what we can actually do -- including how much money we can spend (sometimes none).

5. The students go nuts on implementation, tracking all the results (or as much as can be done by the end of the semester).

6. The client comes back for a second presentation, in which the students report what they did and what that accomplished.

Benefits: Two presentations means twice as many speaking opportunities. Clients have input before the end of the semester. More realistic. Forces students to DO instead of think about evaluation. Measurable results = good portfolio/interview material.

Drawbacks: Depends heavily on client participation and willingness to respond in a timely manner. More work, or maybe just more challenging work, for the instructor and the students.

Using reading circles in a graduate seminar

Last year I participated in a faculty learning community (facilitated by UGA's Center for Teaching and Learning) on Collaborative Learning. Every week one of us spoke on some form of collaborative learning we use in our classes -- I spoke about using wikis for PR Campaigns and in my Word-of-Mouth Communication course. My colleagues around campus are doing some really creative things, and I walked out of the experience with tons of great ideas.

The first one I'm implementing is a variation on an assignment by Dr. Robert Hill, an adult learning prof in the College of Education. His assignment, as I understand it, was based on learning circles that are used in the education field. I'm teaching a section of the Proseminar in Mass Communication, our mass comm theory class for first-year M.A. students; my colleague Dr. Janice Hume is teaching the other section. I modified Bob's project to fit our class size and specific needs, and Janice and I are both using it in our sections.

Here's how it works. Each student is assigned to a team of six (which works out to three teams per section) that works together throughout the semester. Each student takes a different role each week (with six roles, they'll fill each role twice), and fills out a prep sheet to help them fulfill their role during the small group discussion. The roles are discussion leader, devil's advocate, passage master, illustrator,  connector, and question collector. The prep sheets instruct the students on what they should do to fulfill that role before class and during the discussion. For example, the passage master identifies key passages with important ideas that should be included in the discussion. Students use the prep sheets during class and then turn them in to be graded. (This replaces the two-page summary and analysis of the readings assignment that is often used in grad seminars.)

Students go to hour-long small-group meetings in one of the seminar rooms or across the street in the Student Learning Center. Then we reconvene for a second hour of large-group discussion.

The first week, the students said that they enjoyed the small group discussions and that having specific roles helped them prepare and participate. However, in both of the sections, the large group discussion lagged. So, we emphasized that the purpose of the small group is to prepare for the large group, and suggested that the question collector take 5 minutes at the end of the discussion to query the group on which big issues or concepts should be brought forward to the large group. The second week's large group discussions were much livelier as a result.

We also emphasized the importance of writing good questions and challenges for the prep sheets. For instance, the discussion leader should NOT ask, "what is the hypodermic model?" -- if everyone did the reading, they should already know the answer. Instead, dig deeper: "who benefits from promoting a limited effects model of communication?"

I think the assignment is perfect for this course, because it's teaching first-year grad students how to analyze and synthesize readings, prep for a grad seminar, and participate in both small group and large group discussions. So far, the students seem to like it, and having both written and oral components allows me to monitor their individual and collective progress. The prep sheets are a lot more fun to grade than the standard two-page analyses, and I think it's probably more fun for them as well, particularly with the rotating roles. In addition, working in the same small groups gives students a chance to get to know each other, which is a benefit to students new to the program. 

I am happy to share the prep sheets and assignment with interested faculty. Just e-mail russell (dot) uga (at) gmail (dot) com.

Fall 2008 PR Campaigns class clients

This semester I have two teams, each with 9 members (one male on each, if anyone's counting). I chose two clients that I thought might really help the students in their job searches/careers.

First, Power Partners. I don't usually work with for-profit organizations, but this was a project I couldn't resist -- promoting solar thermal water heaters. Aside from the potential to have a positive impact on the environment, what drew me to this campaign is the opportunity for students to learn about business-to-business public relations and marketing. This is an area that is not often covered in PR classes, or at least not very in depth, so I think it presents an opportunity for the students to differentiate themselves from the pack during their job searches. The team with the client Tuesday, and next week will be visiting the plant. So, they're going to be learning about B2B, search engine marketing, and green building.

Second, Grady College alumni. The College is beginning its centennial capital campaign, and the students will be focusing on young alumni (1-5 years out). In the client meeting today, Grady staff and my students talked about making it more than just fundraising, but offering something back to alums. This might include a young alumni group, professional development, sharing information on jobs/resumes, and so on. I think the team is pretty excited about creating ways to build relationships between Grady and young alums, as well as among the young alums. Of course, it's likely that social media will figure prominently in this project. So, they're going to be learning about fund raising, social media, and relationship building.