Colleges are using current students' and their parents' enthusiasm for the institution as an effective recruitment tool. Student contact with prospective students on campus visits, hometown contacts, and parent phone calls to prospective students' parents are useful strategies. Most are volunteers though some students are paid for their time as…

Surveys academic programs in public relations, finding that most pay only lip service to the goal of preparing public relations graduates for managerial responsibility. Offers recommendations for public relations management course content and highlights examples of innovative teaching strategies. (SR)

The media continues to be blamed by higher education administrators for blowing college costs out of proportion. While there may be reasonable answers to questions about higher education costs and productivity, the media have to ask them and institutions must respond. Weak coverage of higher education by the media does not help higher education.…

Notes changes in the past decade in the field of public relations. Proposes four new required core competencies for all undergraduate public-relations majors in programs housed in journalism/mass-communication units. Articulates these regarding appropriate outcomes, pedagogies, and assessment methods. Notes special considerations for small,…

Offers three models for educating future public-relations practitioners from a communication point of view: a macro-approach that integrates outcomes, curriculum, pedagogy and assessment at the program level; a micro-approach that adds specifics of outcomes, pedagogy, and assessment strategies for each of five core course-content areas; and a…

Describes the environmental program of East Kentucky Power Co-op, which has included an extensive biological survey of power line corridors, related environmental education in area schools, recycling activities, innovative techniques to meet clear air and water regulations, harvesting rare plant seeds and distributing them to schools and youth…

A media training program conducted for faculty and administrators at Seton Hall University (New Jersey) is described. The program has helped participants become more confident in speaking to media, enhanced the university's visibility, and built campus confidence in the public relations staff. Suggestions are made for selecting the target audience…

Corporate sponsorship is a marketing strategy by which companies communicate about their products or services by affiliating with events or institutions valued by targeted customer groups. Increasingly, campus communicators are seeking to establish corporate sponsorships but first must resolve legal and ethical concerns. Various types of…

This special section includes papers from the 1997 Library Administration and Management Association (LAMA) Systems and Services Section (SASS) preconference, "Write On!" which introduced participants to the tenets of effective writing. Four topics of interest to librarians include: writing a research paper, transforming an oral presentation into…

Presents results of survey of senior level public relations executives in for-profit organizations, regarding: what courses should be taught in a public relations curriculum; skills public relations graduates should take into their first jobs; the skill-level of recent hires; and in what department, school, or college public relations should be…

Presents a case study for use in business communication classes to help students understand and learn both the context and the strategies for communication with business and management. Looks at communication strategies employed by Denny's during its crisis caused by charges of racial discrimination. Includes actual communications instrumental in…

Review of recent articles defines elements of risk management for camps: an organizational culture of safety; properly trained and certified staff; continuous improvement, feedback, and input involving all personnel; and a flexible communication policy. Both participation in leisure activities and related lawsuits have risen steadily in recent…

Successful college and university telephone fund-raising campaigns depend on basic techniques such as asking for larger donations and attaining a high fulfillment rate, but these techniques require careful caller training. Specific approaches include role-playing, encouraging taking time to build rapport, requiring follow-up on pledges, letting…

Describes how Hartford Technical High School (Maryland) doubled its enrollment, quadrupled the number of applicants, and kept its attrition to about 2% as a result of a seven-year marketing program. (JOW)

Studies the electronic contributions of academic and practitioner public relations professionals on the listserv called PRForum. Examines 200 messages for dialectic interacts (two or more messages on one topic); analyzes further in terms of the applied model of speech act theory. Assesses the impact of language creation via technology, especially…