Public Relations Curriculum Research Articles

Recognising a signature pedagogy for public relations teaching and learning in the last twenty years

PurposeThis study attempts to identify the drivers for change in Public Relations education and what assumptions are made about professional practice. The authors suggest signature pedagogy has the potential to deepen our understanding of the teaching and learning of Public Relations and what this means as the Public Relations curriculum adapts. The paper has theoretical and practical value. It forefronts the concept of signature pedagogy as a fresh way to look at Public Relations teaching and learning that can be developed.Design/methodology/approachThis paper aims to explore the historical and contemporary context of teaching Public Relations within a university setting, how it has evolved and the assumptions that underpin it both nationally and internationally. Using a mixed methods approach, the paper investigates how the curriculum has changed since 2000, how it interacts with industry and how it reflects educational historical and contemporary frameworks. It also explores the assumptions on which Public Relations education was and is based and whether signature pedagogy is evidenced.FindingsThis study concludes that, from a signature pedagogy perspective, many current Public Relations curricula emphasise surface structures of learning. Deep structures, focusing on critical engagement and conceptual approaches to problem solving, are more variable, disconnected and contested. The data indicate the existence of an Anglo-American, skills-based approach to Public Relations knowledge, alongside international nuances around multi-culturalism. From a practical viewpoint, the paper contributes to how Public Relations programmes can be designed, taught and adapted in the future.Originality/valueThe paper evidences fully unique, primary research.

The Other Side of the Coin: An Analysis by Turkish Public Relations Professionals on the Qualifications of Public Relations Academics and Curricula

This study aims to investigate the opinions and perceptions of senior Turkish public relations practitioners on the knowledge, skills, competencies, and personal attributes of public relations academics and public relations curriculums. A total of 20 semi-structured interviews were conducted with public relations practitioners working in corporations or consultancies. Results show that the top knowledge areas for public relations practitioners include sociology, psychology, and communication, the most prominent skills include communication skills, IT skills, and visioning, the most important personal attributes include good image, sensitivity/humanity, and life-long learner, and the top competencies are performing and creating. Practical knowledge is as important as theoretical knowledge. Public relations professionals have respect for public relations academics, appreciate their input, but they suggest that the public relations curriculum should be improved and that the graduates should be better informed. This paper also reveals how a dialogue can be established between Turkish public relations academics and professionals. The collected data were analyzed under the guidance of Wengers’ communities of practice framework, and suggestions for forming communities of practice were proposed by taking the dimensions of events, leadership, connectivity, membership, learning projects, and artifacts into account. By providing data from Turkey, the findings of this work can help us improve industry–academia ties and subsequently contribute to the professionalization of public relations.

Purpose and practice

Business thinking, engagement with stakeholders, and the practice of public relations haveall been confronted with major paradigmatic shifts – especially as these are contextualized byenvironments that are increasingly pluralistic. This has contributed to an important question intowhat the education of future public relations practitioners (PRPs) should be so that they canpurposefully and successfully navigate and negotiate the challenges of decision-making – thatare ethical and moral in nature – in the context of complex, and diverse practice. In light ofthis, public relations curriculum developers and educators are challenged to address issues ofpurpose, values-based practice and education in order to prepare future PRPs for the ethical andmoral challenges that they will encounter. In the South African context this is further complicatedby the recent calls for decolonisation of South African public relations curricula. This conceptualand exploratory paper addresses the issue of practice in an age of purpose, the changing roles ofpublic relations practitioners, and the contribution values-based education can make in addressingdemands for revised, and decolonised PR curricula.

Editing as part of an advertising and public relations curriculum

The general philological discipline, Editing, has been part of a journalism curriculum since the middle of the last century. There are leading experts and practice-proven methods of teaching editing to journalism students. In his publication, the author argues for including editorial competencies training in the curriculum of a bachelor’s degree in advertising and public relations. The study draws on the Federal State Educational Standard of Higher Education and the syllabus of the academic discipline. It takes into account market conditions (professional competition, high demands on the part of consumers for the quality of media communications) and the staffing and methodological support for teaching editing in applied communications at St. Petersburg University. The discipline, Editing in Advertising and Public Relations, is focused on an activity-based approach in training specialists in applied communications. Drawing on educational and methodological literature, instruction follows a developed methodology for editorial work with advertising and PR texts.

Making space for activism studies in public relations curricula

This article aims to stimulate debate about public relations education and its curricula. It questions why, when prominent public relations theorists are establishing a developing relationship between activism and public relations, is this research not reflected in public relations curricula? The functionalist approach (where public relations is taught as a neutral organisational function) is endorsed by public relations’ powerful credentialising bodies, and strongly influences the content of public relations’ educational objectives. Rather than allow this functionalism to dominate curricula objectives, public relations teachers, as professionals, have a responsibility to deconstruct public relations practice and critique the role it plays in society. This article proposes that incorporating activism studies into public relations curricula provides an opportunity for public relations teachers to navigate this complexity. In addition, incorporation of activism studies in public relations curricula has the potential to provide a platform for public relations to consolidate its position as a progressive field of knowledge and practice in a dynamic and complex environment.

4차 산업 혁명 시대의 5대 PR 교육 과정 제안

배경 및 목적 4차 산업 혁명 및 디지털 시대로의 전환이라는 급격한 환경 변화를 맞은 PR이 고유의 가치를 유지하고 확장 하기 위해서는 새로운 PR 교육 과정의 마련이 필요하다. 이 연구는 PR이 4차 산업 혁명의 시대에서도 다른 유사 영역과 차별화될 수 있고, 고유의 기능과 가치를 확장시킬 수 있는 방안을 제안했다. 방법 4차 산업 혁명, 초연결 사회, 데이터 자본주의 사회, 디지털 트랜스포메이션 사회, 디지털 혁명, 계층, 계급, 갈등, 정보 보호 등에 관한 다양한 문헌에서 제공하고 있는 개념들과 경제학, 사회학, 갈등 및 협상학의 개념 들을 활용하는 자기 성찰적 연구에 의해 진행했다. 결과 및 논의 PR 영역이 4차 산업 혁명을 주도하기 위해서는 PR 교육 과정에 데이터에 관한 이해, 공중 간 연결성에 관한 이해, 테크놀로지에 관한 이해, 갈등에 관한 이해, 윤리에 관한 이해 등이 필요하다. PR 교육 과정에 이와 같 은 5대 교과 과정을 주도적으로 채택할 것을 제안한다.

EVALUATION OF PUBLIC RELATIONS CURRICULUM ON STUDENT AND SECTOR EXPECTATIONS: A RESEARCH ON ISTANBUL PROVINCE

Communication education is important for every sector today. Students who receive public relations education should be directed to success by teaching honesty not only for today but also in their profession, which is open to all kinds of changes they will face in the long term. This qualitative research is an important article aimed at questioning the actuality of public relations education and curriculum. In this context, it was ensured that students and public relations managers evaluate the public relations curriculum. The article allowed public relations students and public relations managers to evaluate public relations education and curriculum. The study was carried out in 2 different samples. In the first sample, interviews were conducted with 44 public relations students about public relations education and curriculum with a semi-structured in-depth interview method. In the second stage, with the semi-structured in-depth interview method, 11 public relations managers were interviewed about public relations education and curriculum. In the findings of the study, the importance of foreign language, practical and theoretical knowledge for a good public relations education was revealed. It was concluded that both sides pointed out only the inadequacy of practical education. It has also been concluded that it emphasizes the importance of applied public relations. Accordingly, the importance of including applied education in the curriculum has emerged.

Problematising history in the public relations curriculum

PurposeThe aim of this paper is to begin a conversation about historicising the public relations (PR) curriculum in universities.Design/methodology/approachThe paper discusses PR history and historiography to identify the underlying ideological and methodological influences. It considers scholarship on PR education, and the inclusion or, more often, the exclusion of history except where it serves to reinforce a narrative of steady, and apparently unproblematic, professional development. The paper reviews the presentation of history in textbooks and discusses the authors' experiences of teaching PR history. The paper concludes with a discussion of how the inclusion of history in the PR curriculum offers an important critical intervention in PR education.FindingsThe PR curriculum tends to meet industry expectations around practice and skills in order to develop students as future practitioners. But this paper argues that a more historical and historiographical understanding of PR can develop in students important skills in research, analysis and interpretation. It can also introduce students to working with ambiguity and alternate perspectives. Foregrounding new histories and challenging existing histories introduce students to richer and more complex understandings of PR. It also introduces students to epistemology and ethics, and therefore offers a way to introduce critical thinking into the curriculum.Originality/valueA more historical understanding of PR develops student skills in research, analysis and interpretation as well as critical thinking.

Changing representations of activists and activism in public relations textbooks

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to respond to Coombs and Holladay’s (2012a) concern that textbooks have had a powerful and negative influence on public relations’ curricula because they have positioned public relations as a function of business, rather than as a field of knowledge and practice that plays an emancipatory role in society.Design/methodology/approachThe paper is a diachronic, thematic analysis of public relations textbooks dating from 1981 to 2017. This methodology is valid because textbooks not only disseminate the knowledge base associated with a community of practice, but they are also influential legitimisers of curricula and bodies of knowledge.FindingsThe findings show that public relations textbooks are slowly evolving to include activist studies as a content area from both a strategic business perspective and a critical perspective.Research limitations/implicationsThe sample size is small but sufficient to indicate the beginnings of a trend. While the influence of textbooks on curricula is waning as students look beyond prescribed texts to a wider array of readings, they remain the most influential educational medium worldwide (Fuchs and Bock, 2018).Practical implicationsThe paper calls for a greater inclusion of activist studies in contemporary public relations curricula to prepare practitioners for changes to the communications environment, as well as an opportunity for public relations to reposition itself as an emancipatory field of knowledge and practice.Social implicationsActivism studies, as a curriculum field, provide a foundation for positioning public relations as an emancipatory practice.Originality/valueThe paper proposes that incorporating activism studies into public relations curricula is a way for public relations to reframe itself as a field of knowledge and practice that plays an emancipatory role in society.

Vocational Public Relations Education: Does It Meet Employers’ Entry-level Needs?

.

Public relations in an online environment: Discourse description of social media in Kuwaiti organizations

Public relations (PR) practitioners strongly believe that social media are changing the way PR is practiced. While it is premature to confirm the change, previous research has found that PR practitioners remain trialing with social media for purposes related to organizational communication. By conducting in-depth interviews with 19 practitioners from corporate, governmental and non-profit organizations in Kuwait, this qualitative study aims to understand how Kuwaiti organizations use social media to achieve PR objectives, the advantages and barriers PR practitioners face when using them as well as the extent whether or not social media have changed PR. Kuwaiti organizations were found to use Twitter and Instagram the most for promotion and information dissemination, but the use is generally occasional and reactive. Extending the organizations’ reach and popularity of social media among Kuwaitis were the main advantages for using this type of media, while lack of social media strategy, lack of technical skills, and confusion of the two-way communication approach were the main barriers. A new finding can be added to the literature where insufficient educational background was found to contribute to the practitioners’ reluctance to adopt and adapt to using social media. As to any causing change to PR, the respondents believe that social media have broadened the field and have made organizations look less official and more mainstream in the popular culture. The implications of the findings suggest the need for a strategic approach in terms of purpose, roles, responsibilities, policies and guidelines toward the management of social media between higher management and PR practitioners. Improvements to PR curriculum and practicum are also needed to integrate communication technologies into PR practice.

Competences Basque Advertising Professionals Consider Most Important to Their Work: A Comparison 2008–2016

This research explores the opinions of Basque advertising professionals regarding the importance of distinct areas of competence to their daily work and those in which they plan to pursue additional training over the next five years. Results of a survey conducted in 2016 are compared with data from a similar study conducted in 2008. Findings indicate that although sector opinion in the Basque County regarding the relative need for specific competences in the workplace has not substantially changed between 2008 and 2016, digital marketing skills have become substantially more important during this period. The areas of competence practicing professionals continue to consider most relevant to their work are creativity and strategic planning, followed by digital marketing, sales skills, management, media planning, graphic design and advertising copywriting. In addition to the functional competences covered in the prior study cited above, this study addresses attitudinal competences, which individuals surveyed agreed were crucial in their field. The findings presented here offer professional insight into the relative weight that competences should have in distinct areas of undergraduate advertising and public relations curricula. Of interest to schools operating within the European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System, the data compiled on the importance of attitudinal competences in daily sector work strongly suggest that attitudinal competences should carry a specific weight in ECTS credits awarded in this type of undergraduate programme.

Competencias más valoradas por los profesionales de la publicidad de la Comunidad Autónoma Vasca. Comparación 2008-2016

This research explores the opinions of Basque advertising professionals regarding the importance of distinct areas of competence to their daily work and those in which they plan to pursue additional training over the next five years. Results of a survey conducted in 2016 are compared with data from a similar study conducted in 2008. Findings indicate that although sector opinion in the Basque County regarding the relative need for specific competences in the workplace has not substantially changed between 2008 and 2016, digital marketing skills have become substantially more important during this period. The areas of competence practicing professionals continue to consider most relevant to their work are creativity and strategic planning, followed by digital marketing, sales skills, management, media planning, graphic design and advertising copywriting. In addition to the functional competences covered in the prior study cited above, this study addresses attitudinal competences, which individuals surveyed agreed were crucial in their field. The findings presented here offer professional insight into the relative weight that competences should have in distinct areas of undergraduate advertising and public relations curricula. Of interest to schools operating within the European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System, the data compiled on the importance of attitudinal competences in daily sector work strongly suggest that attitudinal competences should carry a specific weight in ECTS credits awarded in this type of undergraduate programme.

We are what we teach: The impact of persuasive communication on Philippine PR history and contemporary PR education

The history of the Philippines is one of colonial struggle. It is no wonder that the indelible marks of three and a half centuries of Spanish colonization followed by five decades of American occupation are still intensely palpable in every aspect of Philippine society. The aftermath of centuries of domination is no more pronounced than in the education of its citizens. This paper aims to trace the evolution of Philippine public relations education, examine its influences and critically evaluate the content and status of the public relations curriculum using a post-colonial lens. Public relations is one of the Philippine imports from the United States after the Second World War. This study interrogates how this Western transplant is addressing the dueling interests of multiple stakeholders and the competing priorities of a developing country steeped in the traditions of a colonial past. Through a primary analysis of 20 Philippine undergraduate and graduate programs, personal interviews and secondary research, the historical analysis revealed private, mostly Catholic, universities as key providers of PR education. The study also found that Philippine PR education is still nascent, elitist, and requires a research culture to help professionalize practice.

Leadership in the Classroom: An Examination of Exposure to Leadership Theory and Training in Public Relations Course Curricula

The purpose of this study is twofold: first, to take an initial step toward determining whether leadership theory is valued in public relations (PR) undergraduate education; second, to explore the focus on leadership as a distinct pedagogical concentration within the leading undergraduate PR programs in the United States. The results indicate that most departments offer one or two leadership-specific courses within the PR curriculum. However, PR instruction focuses more on skills training than leadership theory. It appears that PR professors do an adequate job teaching students good management skills, but curricula need more focus on theoretical understanding of leadership and application within the PR profession.

Professionalisation and public relations education: Industry accreditation of Australian university courses in the early 1990s

This paper investigates the Public Relations Institute of Australia's introduction in 1991 of a national accreditation programme for university courses. Drawing on an analysis of previously unstudied industry archives, it identifies four themes significant for industry perspectives of education: public relations knowledge; industry expectations and experience; public relations curricula; and academic legitimacy. While university education was perceived by institute members to demonstrate the professional standing of public relations, the findings reveal divergent understandings of its role and content and identify considerable resistance to the institutionalisation of public relations knowledge. At the same time, the expansion and marketisation of higher education led to the introduction of new, vocational courses such as public relations. The significance of this study is it offers new insights into the development of Australian public relations education and the role of the professional association.

The State of PR Graduate Curriculum as We Know It

This longitudinal content analysis study uses the Commission on Public Relations Education’s 2006 report as a benchmark to determine whether master’s education in public relations has evolved over the past decade. Findings show a lack of uniformity across the 75 programs studied. In addition, there is a lack of adherence to the Commission on Public Relations Education’s recommended content areas. The authors theorize that the variety of academic homes and titles partly explains the lack of uniformity. But also graduate public relations curricula may lack standardization because of different models.

A Disciplinary Perspective

This article investigates the internationalization of public relations education, by examining public relations education in Australia, its relation with the public relations industry, and its growth in response to international student- and market-led demand. The discussion highlights the tensions within what is essentially an education project driven in part by stakeholders seeking to professionalize the industry and in part by university staff seeking academic legitimacy and disciplinary status for public relations within a rapidly changing higher education sector. Tensions between the local, national, and global contexts of higher education, and academic, industry and market factors are evident. In particular, the process of developing an internationalized curriculum exposes the narrow disciplinarity and weak theoretical foundations of a field, which emerged out of industry practice and is strongly influenced by U.S. scholarship. It is concluded that internationalization of the public relations curriculum offers scholars the possibility to address the ethnocentric values and narratives of their discipline and improve learning outcomes for students.

Contemporary Chinese public relations education: development and challenges

This study provides a comprehensive update of Chinese public relations education. Particularly, it (1) examined the challenges facing Chinese public relations education and (2) explored the positive changes that have emerged in Chinese public relations education. Researchers conducted 49 face-to-face in-depth interviews with Chinese public relations educators, students, and professionals supplemented with a content analysis of 22 Web sites of Chinese universities with public relations programs. Major findings include: (1) absence of doctoral programs, (2) rigid public relations curriculum structure, (3) dominance of traditional public relations pedagogy, (4) lack of qualified public relations educators, and (5) inadequate institutional recognition. In addition to these key challenges that Chinese public relations education confronts, it has also been undergoing some promising changes. For example, public relations education is adjusting to meet the needs of students. Educators are developing both educational and professional expertise. Moreover, there has been a rise of government public relations in the context of China's rapid economic and political reform.

Developing global practitioners

Intercultural competence, defined as the skills required for an increasingly globalised world, is poorly understood in both higher education and in its value for different professions. The challenge for educators is how to develop such competence – as a kind of professional knowledge – through the curriculum. This paper explores industry expectations of intercultural competence in public relations graduates in two cities, Singapore and Perth, and offers useful insights into the perceived value of intercultural competence for public relations. The study highlights the need for intercultural competence, as both an understanding of cultural difference and as it applies to professional knowledge, to be incorporated into public relations curricula. The findings highlight the difficulties in offering a ‘national’ curriculum, which is then exported to other countries, and demand educators address the ethnocentric values and narratives of their discipline. These findings are significant given the internationalisation of public relations education and the need to prepare graduates for careers in public relations in a globalised world.