Public Relations

[Welshman]

One of the courses I have to deliver is English in Public Relations.

There's no curriculum or course content whatever. I've boned up on PR 'til it's coming out of my ears but having real problems attaching that to activities, etc, for the 'English' bit.

Is there anyone out there who's been through this. If so, would be mighty grateful for any pointers, sources of information or downloads etc.

I've tried countiless searches but haven't found anything that comes even close.

Help!

[khall64au]

PM me your email address and I'll send you some course outlines.

[richard10365]

I use to work in Public Affairs for LA Recruiting Battalion for the US Army. What type of info are you looking for?

[khall64au]

Excuse me for saying so but the US Army must have the ultimate course in PR

[Welshman]

I use to work in Public Affairs for LA Recruiting Battalion for the US Army. What type of info are you looking for?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Well, the course title is Business English in Public Relations. So, it's about PR as is but the use of English in PR.

I ordered a book about writing for PR but no use at all. Need examples, exercises, possible project ideas etc. These kids need a lot of practice with their English but I still have to deliver, examine, assess etc all for their degree.

[Ladphrao]

In my experience these English for "fill in the blank" courses are usually primarily English Courses. I recommend treating it that way, do "normal" English teaching activities, but use material related to PR. I don't think your focus is meant to be to teach PR, but as the course title suggest, teach English for use in PR operations. Let the PR Ajarn teach PR. A mistake I have seen teachers make in these types of courses is to forget that it is primarily an English course and the teacher tries to turn it into a course focusing on the subject matter. I have seen one teacher turn an “English for Finance” course into a course on how to play the stock market. The teacher has credentials to teach English, but has no formal education in finance and only has some experience in buying some stocks in the States online during the bubble years. The course is not very popular with the students, who are almost all English Majors and have little interest in finance itself even if it was being taught by someone with a background in finance..

Just my couple satang worth

[Welshman]

Thanks to both of you (to khall64au for his (her?) email with course structure). Yes, I think you're probably right. I have the same students for several other modules all with different titles.

At the last one, I asked them to write a simple letter, and was shocked by the standard of their written English.

Probably will take khal64au's framework and put some meat on it in the form of tons of written work. I also deliver a module on Bus Eng in Advertising - I was crapping bricks about it but just finished the first (3 hour) session and both I (and, I think the students) thoroughly enjoyed it.

These were adults but the same problem arose - use of English, especially written English. I'll probably use quite a bit of the material from this one in the PR thing too as some themes do overlap.

Thanks again, which all goes to show that for anyone teaching Thailand, ThaiVisa forum is a MUST.

Edited October 30, 2005 by Welshman

[richard10365]

I use to work in Public Affairs for LA Recruiting Battalion for the US Army. What type of info are you looking for?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Well, the course title is Business English in Public Relations. So, it's about PR as is but the use of English in PR.

I ordered a book about writing for PR but no use at all. Need examples, exercises, possible project ideas etc. These kids need a lot of practice with their English but I still have to deliver, examine, assess etc all for their degree.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

There was one book, AP Style book, http://www.apstylebook.com/ (I think it was this one) that I used as a guide to writing during my time working in Public Affairs. It guided me in the journalist format used for writing stories for the news. It was a book on journalist grammer and style.

All my public affairs stories used this format.

I am not a journalist but somehow ended up with that job. That style of writing is somewhat different than regular writing.

In PR, I was either reporting on a story or talking about an upcomming event. PR takes really bad news and tries to make it a little better than it really is. It takes something good and turns it into something great! It tries to take a negative aspects of your business and turn it into something that sounds challenging and worthy of being part of your business.

At times, its more like creative writing as the plain on boring truth about your business gets turned into something spectucular!

Perhaps these are the intentions of the author of your project.

[Felix Lynn]

Here's my two cents...or baht...

Lesson plans I would definitely teach:

1) Pitching stories to the media. Writing a pitch letter. How to talk to a reporter, editor, producer. The dos and don'ts of working with the media. You could role play this to death.

2) Writing a press release, which is basically like writing a news story: who, what, when, where, why, how...etc.

3) How to read a newspaper without spending all day reading it. Then have them summarize. Very important in PR to be able to talk about the news.

4) Writing speeches. Had to do this constantly in agency PR. Teach them how to write a speech. Teach them how to give one. I've got a great book on speeches, PM me for info.

5) Have them develop a PR campaign. What are the goals, the messages, how will they be delivered, how can you measure the impact of the campaign.

6) Pitching clients. Developing a pitch to a potential client.

7) Crises communication. Have them search for a recent situation were PR was needed and have them analize if it was successful. I'm sure if you did a search on the web you might find some things for crisis communications.

A few suggestions. I hope it helps.

[Welshman]

Many thanks to all the posters. I really was losing sleep over this but have taken a bit of all your suggestions and work on that.

Yes, got them doing a Crisis Management press release now - they run a factory where 3 workers have just been killed in an accident. Be interesting to see what they make of that one.

The speeches idea is great - they need to brush up on their spoken English.

As a project, I've suggested to the college that they do a house journal but instead of making up a fictional one, they do one for the college. Not sure if the college will fly on that one but has endless potential.

Again, great to be a part of Thai Visa - not end of friends and helpful suggestions.