Author Archives: Baylor Instant Impact

Class dismissed!

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It’s summer, so this blog is inactive. During the fall and spring semesters, this site is where students in Writing for Media Markets, taught by Meg Cullar, share their weekly blogs evaluating different media outlets. Each student has his or her own blog, and the posts feed into this one.

Spring 2013 was a great semester, and the class members did a terrific job blogging on the media. For some reason, they seem to think that blogging is more fun than their regular writing assignments. It might be because they have to rewrite and rewrite and rewrite their regular assignments. Or maybe it’s because the blog is the only writing they are allowed to do in first person!

The students get to be more casual and humorous in their opinion writing, and it’s always fun to see more and more personality come through as they become comfortable with the format. One student this spring titled his personal blog, “Meg Cullar Made Me Do This.” So we got started off on the right foot!

Public Relations blog assignment

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For this week’s blog, you are going to read a public awareness campaign case study and write about it. These case studies are posted by the Ad Council, a private nonprofit organization that is responsible for many of the public awareness campaigns you  recognize. A list of the case studies is here: Ad Council Case Studies

Please choose one of these two:

Drunk Driving Prevention (third from the top)

Wildfire Prevention (the last one)

Once you are on the campaign’s page, (1) read the summary on that page. (2) Watch the video (top right corner). Then (3) click the pdf link under the video and read the entire case study. Both of the pdf documents are four pages, so you don’t have to figure out which one is shorter. (Do I know you or what?)

For your blog: • Write about your personal knowledge of the campaign — where you have seen it, what you remember about it, etc. • Why do you think it is effective or not effective. • If the campaign has had a personal affect on you or someone you know, tell us about that. • What strategies did the campaign use and which do you think were most effective (the use of a mascot like Smokey Bear, the use of peer pressure, straightforward education about the issue, slogans)? • What did they measure to determine results? (It’s more than one thing in both cases.) • Share your overall reaction to the campaign or any other thoughts you have about it.