About

The Course: MSC 452 Public Relations & Advertising Campaigns

Course Syllabus

Instructor: Shujun Jiang

Email: shujun.jiang@uaeu.ac.ae

Office Location:  H1Room-2148

Required Text: Ronald D. Smith, Strategic Planning for Public Relations (Mahwah, NJ.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 5th edition, 2017).

Recommended Text: George E. Belch & Michael A. Belch, Advertising and Promotion: An Integrated Marketing Communication Perspective (New York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin, 12th edition 2020)

COURSE DESCRIPTION

This course examines the conceptualization, planning, and management of corporate and non-profit public relations campaigns. Problem-oriented case study approaches will be used to create and plan campaigns. The class will work on individual and group projects on developing and executing public relations campaigns.

COURSE OBJECTIVES

The main focus of this course lies in giving students a good grasp of the full range of experiences necessary in planning and executing a public relations campaign. Readings and class discussions will be designed to challenge students to think strategically and creatively throughout the various phases of public relations campaigns that we will methodically cover in class. The central components of the course will include the four major phases of public relations campaigns – formative research, strategic planning, implementation of tactics, and evaluative research. In studying some of these processes, students will be expected to work in small groups to collect primary research data, analyze it, and interpret it for potential clients. We will seek to gain hands-on experience working with clients, identifying organizational problems, and developing solutions to specific public relations challenges.

CONDUCT OF CLASS

Class will consist of lectures, discussions, presentations and invited guest talks if applicable. We will have quizzes/mid-term/and final exams which will generally be based on class discussions, lectures, and readings of the class text. During the semester, we will have one individual presentation of public relations case review and one team work campaign design project. Detailed requirement of the individual and group project are as attached in appendixes:

  • Individual Project: Review of Public relation cases and make a presentation.
    In this course, each student will be required to present an observation of an actual public relations case. Your presentation should include the following information 1) Find a real public relation case, locate and present the facts of the case. 2) Identify a public relations problem or opportunity; describe how it is managed by its public relation team, e.g. what is the goals and objectives, what strategies and tactics are implemented, what are the messages and media platforms are used,  and what is the positive or negative feedback from its organizations and different publics. 3) Discuss your personal observations related to this case. The presentation should be structured in four parts as following the four phases in conducting a campaign: Formative Research,Strategy, Tactics, and Evaluation.
  •  Group Project: Campaign Proposal Design (not for Spring 2021)

Public relation professions work in a team. You can never do strategic planning alone. There is always brainstorm, discussion, consultation, evaluation and group decision. That’s why team work is really important as a PR practitioner. During this course, students will be divided in teams with 3-4 persons each. The teams will be collecting and analyzing original data from a regional/international organization that is dealing with a specific public relations problem. Each team is required to write a campaign proposal presenting your ideas and recommendations for resolving this problem, using the process (the nine steps for strategic communication) described in class and an oral presentation at the end of the semester.

GRADING AND EVALUATION

Students will be graded as follows:

  • 30% – Individual PR case review: presentation and report (20 for analysis, 10 for presentation)
  • 20% – Midterm exam
  • 20% – Final exam/Quiz
  • 20% – Group Project and Presentation
  • 10% – Class participation and discussion

The scale for grading will be as follows:

Performance Grade Score Quality Points
Excellent A ‫100 – 90‬ 4.00
Excellent- A- ‫89 – 87‬ 3.70
Very Good + B+ ‫86 – 84‬ 3.30
Very Good B ‫83 – 80‬ 3.00
Very Good- B- ‫77‬– ‫79‬ 2.70
Good + C+ 7‫4 ‬– 76 2.30
Good C 7‫0 ‬– 73 2.00
Good- C- ‫67 ‬– ‫69‬ 1.70
Pass + D+ 6‫4 ‬–66 1.30
Pass D 60 – 63 1.00
Fail F 0 – 59 0.00
Failure for Absence FA ‫0.0‬ 0.00

Assignments and projects should be handed on time. Lateness will result in grade deduction. No excuse will be accepted.

ACADEMIC INTEGRITY

All students are expected to be honorable and to observe standards of conduct appropriate to a community of scholars. The University expects from its students a higher standard than the minimum to avoid disciplinary action. All acts of dishonesty in any academic work constitute academic misconduct. These include:
Cheating: Using or attempting to use unauthorized materials, information, study aids or computer related information.
Plagiarism: Representing the words, data, works, ideas, computer programs or output, or anything not generated in an authorized fashion, as one’s own.
Fabrication: Presenting as genuine any invented or falsified citation or material.
Misrepresentation: Falsifying, altering, or misstating the contents of documents or other materials you may be using to complete assignments for this class.

ATTENDANCE

One of the marks of a professional is respect for time. Come to class every time it meets and be on time. Two lates will be counted as one absence. Following is the UAEU attendance policy: “Any student who misses two classes will get 5% warning, 5 classes, 10%, and 6-7 classes, 15% and he/she will be dropped out from the course.” The absences will also affect student’s in-class participation negatively. Students’ class attendance will be counted from the first day after their course registration.

In case a student is absence due to sickness, he/she should submit a medical excuse(s) from a public hospital showing that he/she was sick on that specific date(s). Such excuse should also be original and stamped by the hospital a student was treated at. A student should also submit the excuse to the UAEU Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences Advising Unit to be approved before submit it to the instructor. An original copy and another black & white copy should be submitted to the instructor to wave such absence(s). A student should then keep the original copy of the excuse with him/her for future references after showing it to the instructor.

COURSE OUTCOMES

By the end of the semester, students taking this course should be able to:

  1. apply a diverse range of public relations and management skills in a real world situation
  2. offer a professional analysis of a client’s situation through research and planning
  3. demonstrate knowledge of practical application of public relations campaign tools and tactics
  4. demonstrate a willingness to work with others as a team member
  5. show familiarity with the work of professionals in the field

Tentative Course Schedule

Date Lecture Reading Note
Week 1  Discussion of Course Syllabus and Introduction of Strategic and Integrated PR pp 1-16
Week 2 Step1: Analyze the PR situation pp17-33 Sign up for the PR case review
Week 3 Step 2: Analyze the organization pp 34-47
Week 4 Step 3: Analyze the publics pp47-67 Sign up for campaign group
Week 5 Step 4: Establish goals and objectives pp77-92
Week 6 Step 5: Formulate action and responses strategies pp93-136
Week 7 Step 6: Develop message strategy pp93-136 PR campaign proposal
Week 8 Step 6: Develop message strategy pp137-182
Week 9 Mid-term Exam pp137-182
Week 10 Step 7: Selecting communication tacticsInterpersonal/organizational Tactics
Week 11 Step 7: Selecting communication tacticsNew Media/AD and Promotional Tactics pp183-198
Week 12 Step 8 Implementing the strategic plan pp199-214
Week 13 Step 9 Evaluation pp215-237
Week 14  PR Campaign project presentation/proposal pp238-254
Week 15  PR Campaign project presentation/proposal
Week 16  Final exam pp255-270
 

*There might be some shift or change in the above mentioned class lecture schedule depending on the Department, college, and/or UAEU academic activities.

About The Instructor: Dr. Shujun (Penny) Jiang

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I am currently an associate professor in the Department of Media and Creative Industries at United Arab Emirates University (UAEU). Prior to joining UAEU, I was visiting at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in the USA. I was also a visiting scholar at Syracuse University in 2006. I received my Ph.D. in Media and Communication from the City University of Hong Kong (2008) and M.A. in journalism and communication from Tsinghua University, China (2004).My research interests include new media studies, online journalism,  PR and crisis communication,. My research were presented and published in at many international conferences and peer-reviewed journals. My teaching covers both theoretical and practical core courses in mass communication and public relations. Check more of my courses here:

Besides my academic career, I also have expertise in Chinese art. I used to teach Chinese painting at Chinese Community Center in Albany, NY. I have been invited to present workshops at MIT, New York State Museum, Albany Public Library, Albany Festival of Nations, Global Electronics (GE), Union College in the USA, UAEU and Zayed University in the UAE.. Here is a course I taught on Chinese Culture:

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