This weekend, ONU's Public Relations Student Society of America chapter had the opportunity to host the annual central Ohio PaRtners conference. PaRtners is a day long regional activity that allows students the chance to learn and gain helpful insight from professionals in a conference setting. Although the planning process was extensive, being a part of the team that cordinated the event was extremely rewarding.
On Saturday, we had approximately 50 students and 25 professionals in attendance. The day began at 9 a.m. and finished around 4 p.m. The day started with registration and breakfast where students could mingle with one another. Next, our keynote presenter, Daniel Lemin addressed all the students. Lemin is the current owner of Social Studio, PR agency in Los Angeles. Before he started up his own public relations firm, he was the past Corporate Communication Specialist at Google and Director of Paine PR. After the keynote presentation concluded, the first of three sessions began.
During the first session, students chose between one of three presentations to attend. The first three focused on working in a public relations agency, non profit PR and starting up a firm. The second session included presentations about health care public relations, media relations and government PR. After this session, students and professionals broke for lunch. Lunch was sponsored by a local restaurant Kewpee. While the students ate, they were divided into teams and participated in an activity. The activity challenged students to tackle different aspects of public relations in a crisis situation dealing with professor passing a college basketball star so he could play in the NCAA tournament. After lunch ended, the last session was held. The three topics covered in presentations dealt with tips when job searching, transitioning into PRSA and utilizing the use of social media to brand yourself. At the end of the day, the winning team from the activity were selected and awarded a prize, a raffle took place then the ONU PRSSA chapter president made closing remarks.
I was amazed and very thankful that the day ran so smoothly. The food arrived on time, everyone that registered showed up and we stayed on schedule. It was evident that students were enjoying the sessions and professionals were eager to give advice. I had a wonderful time in the sessions I attended and walked away with more knowledge about the PR field.
Great recap to PaRtners Ellen! I think this event really taught us how to work together on a team at such a large scale challenge. As difficult as it was, the successful result was well worth the hard work!
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