Kent State’s latest PR problem is in the comic pages! What would you recommend?

As PR professionals, we all know the importance of monitoring mainstream and social media for mentions of our clients. But does your monitoring system include the comic pages?

Don’t ask my students that question. They don’t read “dead tree” versions of newspapers, and they surely don’t bother with the funny papers. In fact, most will tell you the comics aren’t the least bit funny.

But when today’s edition of Crankshaft mentioned Kent State, one of my Baby Boomer colleagues fired off an email alerting me to the “PR problem” it could create. “What should be do about it,” she asked?

Rather than post my response, I’m asking the ToughSledding faithful for some feedback. What would you do?

The Backstory. Crankshaft is a strip about about a crotchety old bus driver, Ed Crankshaft, who lives with his daughter and son-in-law in a small Northeast Ohio town. The strip is a spin off of Funky Winkerbean and was created by two Kent State grads, Tom Batiuk and Chuck Ayers.

Long story short, Crankshaft’s granddaughter, Mindy, has just graduated high school — but barely, it seems. Her lack of focus and poor grades has parents, Pam and Jeff Murdoch, wondering if Mindy has a future beyond flipping burgers.

Yep. Little Mindy — she ain’t the sharpest tool in the shed. So what will her future hold? A life of servitude at White Castle? Jeff and Pam ponder her fate:

But then…good news from the mailman in today’s strip!

If you follow the Crankshaft story line, you know that Mindy’s admission to Kent State is — well — not good news for those who embrace academic standards. Mindy is an underachiever and a below-average student. And for too many years she was precisely the type of kid associated with our university.

Admissions standards have stiffened over the years, which has led to better quality students. But we all  bristle at that old saying from the 60s and 70s: “Kent Read, Kent Write, Kent State.” Arrgh! It even hurts to key it in, and I’m sure a few administrators will be pissed that I mentioned it. But it’s one of the demons Kent State battles as we try to build more positive perceptions of the university.

Let’s not sugarcoat the issue. Kent State has some highly regarded programs — one of which I’m proud to be a part of. But our overall public image is so-so at best, and most high school seniors see Kent as a “second choice” to in-state competitors Ohio U, Miami U and Ohio State.

The admission of Crankshaft’s Mindy Murdoch, though it’s only in the funny papers, adds salt to an old wound. It reinforces a perception Kent State has been trying to escape for decades.

So help me out. Tell my colleague, and anyone else who’ll listen, what Kent State should do to combat this PR problem in the comic pages. I’ve already told her, via email, what I would do. But I won’t share it until I hear from you.

Any Crankshaft fans out there? How about Kent State fans? How about students currying favor with the old professor? Alumni who need job leads? Anybody?

Edelman Academic Summit #3: My take, finally…

No rest for the old professor this summer. None at all.

It started with a week of intense training in digital storytelling, followed a 3-week crash course in Ethics & Issues. I was student in the former, teacher in the latter.

In the last week of Ethics, I skipped class for a few days to attend the  Edelman’s New Media Academic Summit in Washington. I won’t rehash the sessions. It’s all on conference website, and it’s well worth your time. Some excellent case studies.

Teaching students how to write good*

Read it sometime -- if you have the patience, or if you care.

Fixing online communication one post at a time

Someone should step up and rip the blogosphere a new one. Someone should tell the millions of bloggers, plus the tweeters and Facebookers, that good writing still matters. Those who work in communication-related fields should pay special heed.

But I’ll warn you: It won’t change a thing.

I’ve ranted on the bad writing in this space for nearly 3 years, and I’ve done it in classrooms for more than 2 decades. Posts about writing always draw traffic and comments, but with each post I am preaching to the converted.

Bless all of you who still care about good writing. Your numbers are dwindling.

Saying goodbye to the blogroll — at least for now

I deleted my primary blogroll today. If you were on it, don’t take offense. If you used it as a resource — and I doubt anyone did — sorry about that. It was a decision based on transparency.

A few months back, a Twitter friend asked me why I had so-and-so on the blogroll. I had no answer. Fact is, I had seldom read the blogger in question, who made my list based on some witty Twitter comments.

In fact, I read only about one-third of the writers on my blogroll. There isn’t time for more. But their presence on my personal “A” list implies endorsement. I could leave that one-third in place, but even many of those I don’t read consistently.

Everyone from my former blogroll, and quite a few others, remain on the feeder. I check that feeder about once a week. (Sorry, but I’m busy.) I read blogs daily, and I learn from them. But I find the posts mostly via Twitter or Facebook links, or emails from people I know and whose opinions I trust. Call me lazy, but like I said, I’m busy.

Deleting the blogroll may hurt my readership and may result in my eviction from other blogrolls. But it’s not like I depend on this site for income…though maybe I should.

I was thinking about coining the term “blogrolla.” I wonder how many bloggers would pay me for the traffic I send their way. (Wipe that smirk off your face!) As the home of “blogrolla,” I just might raise a few bucks, you know?

I might also raise a few eyebrows for my lack of ethics, but the way things are going in social media, I doubt it.

How I spent my summer vacation: A letter from Kent State’s ‘Camp Tweety’

Yeah. I’m still alive, filling my vacation time with crazy projects and unreasonable deadlines. I never learn. I just never learn. Here’s how I started the summer…

Dear Mom and Dad,

I spent the first week of my summer vacation at Camp Tweety. (I think they named it for that goofy bird in the cartoon.) I learned a lot about digital storytelling at Camp Tweety, but nearly killed 4 of the camp counselors. They pushed the campers so far out of our comfort zones that I almost hurled — twice. And imagine this: The counselors were my colleagues at Kent State — digital dogs, all of them.

I think, therefore I stink — at persuasive writing

No one cares what you think.

I tell my students this all the time. If you want your bosses and clients to take you seriously, make your case logically and make it with conviction. Don’t start off with: “In my humble opinion…”  People don’t follow your counsel because you “think” you’re right. They follow you because you’ve made a persuasive case based on solid evidence.

A persuasive communicator isn’t tentative. I learned this 35 years ago in a college course called “Argumentation and Debate.” I also learned the value of research — hours and hours of research — from which my team assembled the facts and stories to support our position.

PR Hillbilly Salutes the Good Ole Boys

What the hell. It’s Friday!

What makes you smile? I mean, aside from good red wine and a foot massage? For me, it’s hillbilly singers and the stories they tell. I love those good ole boys, and I live vicariously through them.

I hide my hillbilly roots well. I gave up chewing tobacco long ago. Ditto for squirrel huntin’ and cow tippin’. But somewhere under this PR veneer lies an Appalachian soul that’s part coal miner, part deer hunter, part whiskey sipper.

I know you don’t care about any of this, but it’s Friday. So lighten up. Have a drink. There’ll be time to get serious next week.

Should PR students be forced to blog? We think so

With apologies to National Lampoon!

No, we’ve never threatened to shoot anyone’s dog. But if you want to study PR at Kent State, you can’t pass “PR Online Tactics” without writing a blog and putting it up for the world to see. If that bothers you, you’ll want to find another major.

As PR professionals, we know that blogs are part of the communication landscape. Not all organizations participate, but all are part of the social-media game — even if they don’t play. So a new PR grad must understand blogging — and what better way than learning by doing?

Some disagree with our blog-or-else policy. In her excellent article in JMC Educator, Shearlean Duke reports on a Delphi study involving top-level PR professionals. The Delphi panel lists blogging as one of the key new-media skills PR students should develop. But the panel also insists PR educators SHOULD NOT REQUIRE students to blog, as “forced content skews the transparency of the blogosphere.” Student blogging, they say, should be voluntary.

More blogola, or just smart marketing?

In our Ethics & Issues class this week, we discussed John Stauber’s documentary, “Toxic Sludge Is Good for You.” The film, and the book it’s based on, is a scathing indictment of the public relations business. And while it’s hardly a balanced view, it’s one every PR professional should see. “Toxic Sludge” begins by questioning an axiom long preached in our field: that the “best PR is invisible PR.” Will that approach work in a 2.0 world?

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Adweek’s Brian Morrisey this week reports on the latest social media campaign designed to create buzz. It’s called MyBlogSpark. The campaign features cereal giant General Mills targeting some 900 citizen journalists, most of them mommy bloggers. That’s a sizable and influential group when your job is to sell Cheerios. The campaign is smart and efficient marketing by any standard.

MyBlogSpark sends free product to the bloggers to sample and, if they choose, to review. It’s hardly a blogola scandal, as the bloggers receive nothing more than free consumables and some in-store coupons. If you’re a blogger corrupted by a free box of Kashi Whole Grain, then you’re beyond hope. No one is being “bought” here.

Bad Craziness: How Kent State Failed ‘Crisis 101′

Media reports say 125 police officers were called in to quell the Kent State/CollegeFest riot on April 24. (Daily Kent Stater photo by Katie Roupe)

This post supports a lesson on crisis management and crisis response. Maybe it can help us all. It’s a long one, so go get some fresh coffee.

(Update, Friday, May 1) President Lefton has broken his silence with a lengthy email, but it focuses not so much on last week’s events but on the upcoming two days — traditionally the biggest  party weekend of the year. Wasn’t sure of the best way to share Dr. Lefton’s email, so I’ve opted to post the complete text as “Comment 17″ of this post.)

Talk about timing.

It’s the final 2 weeks of PR Case Studies class, and the topic is crisis management. I need a fresh case to underscore key points from the readings. Where to turn?