Education and PR - latest trends and challenges...

Instead of conclusion

2006-01-09T05:33:00.000-08:00

These are the developments which take place in the field of PR and education. It was a good experience to research and write about it - hopefully I will add some more information to this blog later on...

Some statistical information..

2006-01-09T05:08:00.000-08:00

PR had been a growing industry not only in UK, but elsewhere in the world as well. Nowadays, it is very popular to study it in Russia. As Alexei Sitnikov, president of "Image Contact" consulting group puts it, "they have over-PRed the PR".

While studying, 37 % of Moscow students had an internship in PR agencies and advertising companies, and 51 % in PR departments of commercial organizations.

38 % of specialists consider formal education as a necessary component of professionalism in PR, but 32,9 % think that a degree in social sciences, marketing or journalism would do.

The survey and its analysis ( in Russian) can be viewed here.

Qualifications:are they always good?

2006-01-09T04:48:00.000-08:00

PR is taught by undergraduate, postgraduate and MBA courses, as well as CIPR trainings. More than 500 people have registered to CIPR in September, 2004. And that is not the end of the story. The Chartered Institute of Marketing, and the Communication, Advertising and Marketing Education Foundation (CAM), also offer PR courses - and knowing which qualifications matter to employers and employees (if any) is becoming complex, with many favouring work experience over grades.

With so many opportunities to choose from, people who want to learn PR should be cautious. Manning, Selvage & Lee director of people and development Elizabeth Baines says that she is more in favor of training given in MS&L : "They cover three areas - professional skills, including strategic writing and pitching to the media, business and management skills, and an area lacking in the PR industry - finance,' she adds. How we make money, why we make money, why we fill in timesheets, profit and loss - these are many of the day-to-day problems that all agencies face today and which are not addressed elsewhere."

Another important issue which threatens us is the danger to repeat the studies. CIPR PR and marketing manager Jessica Molloy says the institute has taken a step towards uniformity by approving undergraduate degrees. However, these courses do not contribute towards any of the CIPR's own qualifications, meaning graduates may end up repeating their study if they enrol to one of the institute's offerings.

More pros and cons...

2006-01-09T03:08:00.000-08:00

"You have got a PR degree, show me what you can do".

Many people are still sceptical of idea to learn PR in the university. They point out that academic degree is not crucial thing for PR practitioner. Gregory, who was the UK's first full-time professor of public relations, and is director of the Centre for PR Studies at Leeds Metropolitan University, concedes that, as in other industries, there are some graduates who are unsuitable or are simply not very good.

As Jo Bowman puts in his article "Education: Are PR degrees of any value?", sceptics find it unnatural that future PR practitioners are heading to the library rather than to the bar.

I suppose that formal education of PR is necessary if the industry wants to get rid off its negative image, supported by unfriendly media and "Spin doctor" stars of real life and broadcasting - such as "Absolute Power" BBC series.

University education will help PR practitioners to adapt ethical norms and be even more professional.

Another criticism of PR is that it is not a "subject". Liz Fraser, Human Resources Director at Weber Shandwick, says that "We want people who want to study a subject. PR is something you can teach them later, and we're probably in a better position to do it". Very small percentage of Weber Shandwick employees have PR degree, and most of people working there are English graduates. Liz Fraser says that PR graduates often do not understand quiet well how budgets and behind the scenes of PR works.

Well, I have mentioned business school part of the issue in my previous posts. PR graduates should understand these issues as well. Still I think that what Fraser says might be true, but to a less degree. A PR practitioner working for environmental NGO should definitely have an idea about the case of his client, but no one can expect him/her to be fully knowlegeable of the particular issue. I have found a very interesting article in "The Independent" on how unprofessionalism can damage the reputation of the company. I mention this article to underline the fact that PR is necessary and professionals (educated) should take care of it.

What distinguishes PR graduates from others?

2006-01-09T02:52:00.000-08:00

According to Julia Hobsbawm, who is a professor of public relations at the London College of Communication, it is combining the knowledge, the research and the case studies with an applied edge to real issues that distinguishes PR graduate from graduates of any other discipline. In an interview to PR Week, she talked about MSc program in University of Stirling, which she liked very much, but mentioned that it would be much better to study this program in London.
That is one of the advantages of my current university-the University of Westminster, which is the first one to offer MA in Public Relations in London...

PR in relation to other disciplines

2006-01-09T02:27:00.000-08:00

In terms of education, I think that it is essential for people entering the PR industry to have an idea of communications and marketing. I think these aspects should be underlined in educationary process of PR. The academic discipline of PR would gain a lot from cross-disciplinary research and involvement of advertising, marketing and communications studies.

Phyllis Larsen, an assistant professor in the College of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and Maria Len-Rios, an assistant professor in the School of Journalism at the University of Missouri-Columbia, completed a study in summer of 2003 that surveyed hundreds of advertising, communication, and PR professors across the nation to gauge their perceptions of how extensively their departments had integrated different disciplines. The majority rated their schools as "partially integrated." Additionally, 66% said that the integration of their curricula reflected changes in the PR industry, but only 58% agreed that integrated marketing communications (IMC) training would help their students succeed in the workplace.

I think it is a good idea for PR students to go to business department and take accounting or business strategy classes. PR has a very intriguing educational perspective:it should be well-established as an independent discipline and it should prepare students to the real life, therefore to take into consideration complexity of the industry and provide all necessary skills, having more cooperation with the departments I named above.

New generation of PR people

2006-01-09T00:12:00.000-08:00

Yet another idea came to my mind.. Very few people who are on top of profession began university thinking of PR as an alternative to what they study. But this is also due to the fact that there were very few colleges which offered that degree a couple of decades ago.

I was very curious to know who has pioneered PR education. Professor Ray Simon taught PR courses in Utica for a very long time. When he began more than 50 years ago, there were just a couple of universities in the States which provided PR programs. Today, undergraduate enrollment in PR programs at US four-year colleges and universities are conservatively estimated to be well in excess of 20,000 majors, according to the PRSA. In his interview to PR Week, Ray Simon recalled that demographics has changed a lot as well. PR became much more dominated by women in last decades.

So... What we have now? Those who are on the top of industry are mostly people who transferred into PR later and do not have formal education, but nowadays they prefer to hire employees who actually graduate from communications and PR departments. People who have worked in the industry believe that education would have been useful for them, and try to get education sooner or later as well.. But there are many challenges related to the issue as well.

Formal education: is it necessary?

2006-01-08T18:16:00.000-08:00

There was a wrong stereotype about role of education for people who want to make a career in PR. Some people argued that PR requires a person's ability to communicate well with others, rather than formal education. PR gurus such as Max Clifford and Alastair Campbell do not have any communications degree. But the fact that most people involved into PR (especially famous ones) have not studied it in the university does not necessarily mean that studying it is a bad idea.
On the contrary. Formal education is getting very useful to gain necessary skills and understand different audiences and and think strategically in PR industry. Many people nowadays get to find PR education necessary in order to remain competitive. Sabnis, an AE with Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide in Washington, DC. says that: "I feel that the industry will embark on 360-degree marketing and will need people who are qualified and understand the nature of this unique style of marketing. However, I could never really understand 360-degree marketing without my graduate school education. Therefore, I strongly believe that my academic training prepared me for a career as a PR pro."

PR degrees: do people have them?

2006-01-08T15:08:00.000-08:00

One thing is for sure at the moment. Most of people currently employed in PR have not studied it in the universities. According to industry survey of PR Week, only a minority of employees have communications or PR degrees. Although 74 % of people working in the industry are graduates of social sciences, arts or management studies-fields which are naturally closer to PR.
PR is a relatively young industry, so it is no surprise that most people who are working in this field do not have its educational background. But the industry is growing and getting more complicated and challenging, thus it creates the need to understand, analyze and systematize PR. And to learn it..

Education and PR

2006-01-08T06:55:00.000-08:00

Well, I will share my ideas about developments in the field of academic education of PR. I think this might be a useful idea, as I'm studying PR at the moment. I believe in necessity of education, and I will write about current trends in the field, ideas and expectations of professors, employers and students about the issue.