Public Relations Writing Class

This class has definitely been one of the most helpful classes I have taken, that I can actually apply what I have learned into my field.  Being a Communication major, we have to take ridiculous amounts of classes that consist of theory and culture and communicating, and although a few things might be interesting, they real seem to me like a waste of my time in school.  Like I don't care about theory as much as I do about how to write a press release or take a conference call.  PR writing has taught me a lot about things I actually will be doing for the rest of my career.  I think now that I have a little more of a hands on approach of how PR works and the inner workings of a campaign, I have learned what my strengths and weaknesses are.  I think the more work I do in this field the sooner I will get an idea of where I want to take my interests in this field.  I enjoy the writing aspects the best, but I feel like when I do assignments, or work on the projects, it is much more enjoyable to be working on a topic that you actually care about, because that is when you want to make an impact, and you get creative.  If I could get an internship working for a company that interests me, I would be very lucky and excited to get started.  I really would like to do more writing maybe for magazines like glamour or something that involves a lot of PR, I think that would be really cool.  Anyway, yea PR writing was a tonnn of work but in the long run I am glad I took the class, because for once it was a class that I really did need to take.  It is almost over though...... finally!!!!! I am sooo done with school this semester!!!

Our Group Project

I had a group project for the semester that was using PR to spread awareness about the NJSPCA.  Now that the semester is winding down, we are almost done with all of our final work, and watching everything come into effect. I definitely feel like we had to do a whole lot of work for the project, and it has been very stressful at times, it is well worth it in the end. 

I feel like now that I have had to do so much work for this project, and all of it relates to the concepts that we discussed in lessons throughout the class. Yes we get bookwork here and there, but once we had to relate these assignments to real life clients, I got a much better understand of what PR really is.  We are starting to see that some of our work is being published, and we also got some time slots on popular radio stations.  We have been emailing and calling all sorts of people, drafting and writing endless releases and documents, but it is rewarding to see that all of our hard work is actually doing some good.

I'm so used to having group projects and presentations that are about so much content, but nothing ever as real as this group project.  It is almost like it is a job, and it is seriously real life.  It is definitely a good start to a career in this field.

My Spring Slump

Sooo I know I keep complaining about the winter weather, and now that its finally over I thought my troubles would be also.... but nope I have even more things to complain about now. Not much complaining but more stressing out! I am verrry verry happy about the weather becoming more warm, but I really hope my work ethic becomes better and not worse! I have been so lazy lately with procrastinating homework, and not going to the gym! I need to get back in gear and I can’t figure out what my problem is haha! I really hope that the nice weather will give me more energy because the last thing I need is to pick up spring fever!


Also, I got a little puppy dog! He is the cutest thing ever!! He is a little 4 month old brindle pit-bull boy, aha and his name is Bubba! I did not name him that, he came with the name, but once I started yelling at him all the time, "Bubba NO!" it kind of stuck with me n my roommates. He is also, ALOT of work and a HUGE responsibility. I just really cant go out anymore or leave my apartment too often because he hates being left alone, and needs a lot of attention. We really want to make sure we train him well so that he doesn’t become one of those mean, nasty pit bulls that so many people related with the breed. But he is also such a great, unbelievably cute dog, and me and my roommates love taking him on walks so I think he will be good for us.

So besides all the pressure from school and a new puppy, I also have been freaking out because of work! The tiki bar is finally about to open, so yayyyy I get to make good money again, butt its going to be a lot of long hours squeezed into my schedule. I thought we were opening the bar in two weeks, but we have a work meeting the other day, and since it is going to be so nice towards the end of the week they decided that they will be opening the bar TOMORROW and I get to work it! Hopefully it will be nice out because I need to make money, and pay Verizon since apparently they think I owe them my entire life in order to have a blackberry! I really do love my job though and so I am really exciting to start off yet another summer there.

I also am going to be starting off my horseback riding season in a month, so I REALLY need to start riding and practicing again before we start competing. My pony is so out of shape and she is going to be so slow and misbehaved if I don’t get back on her. I rode the other day for the first time in a month, when everyone else (the die-hards) rides like 4 times a week :-/, aha and I was sooo sore from it. When you don’t ride for a while all those leg mussels go unused, so after you get back on a few weeks later, so literally can barely walk the next day. And my arms were soo sore too because my pony is a little nut and since I haven’t ridden her in so long, she was a little out of control and I have to keep pulling her back like tug of war when I was riding.

Ok, so I think I'm done venting and complaining now. Aha this doesn’t seem so bad anymore, I just cannot be lazy and I need to keep my head up. This could all potentially be very fun, and spring is not so bad, because that means SUMMMER is just around the corner and then there is nooo room for whining.

Opinion Pieces

Soo opinion peices? As much as I would like to say I read often, that would be a lie.  But since I dislike reading alot, I can definitely say that I read newspapers and magezines more than anything else, but normally only if I'm bored at work or need something to entertain my ADD at times.  When I read the newpapers I always skip to the things I actually care about, meaning what can entertain me.  I actually enjoy opinion peices becuase although that arent "newsworthy" all of the time, they do seem to teach you alot about a wide variety of random subjects.  Some people may think of it as useless information, but I would like to refer to it as "qulaity life information".  You will have to listen to peoples opions about whatever given topic it is, but some people bring up excellent points about things that you would have never thought to pay attention to before, and so you can learn something!  Anyway, I think more people should pay attention to opinion pieces in media outlets becuase we need to keep the more personal aspect of the media alive so that we all dont become so maintstream and boring!

ABC Controversy

I think ABC definitely decided to go back on the air because of a bad PR decision. The Academy Awards is one of this channels most important programs a year, and it would be completely foolish is they decided not let it be available to as many as all of cablevisions users. It was a good decision on ABC’s part to allow Cablevision customers to watch the Oscars, only missing an hour of the Award Ceremony. Not showing the Oscars would be a bad more for ABC because it would lose a lot of respect for viewers and cause bad publicity for this family based channel for years to come. It is a better decision to allow themselves to look like the victims in this situation since cablevision has had its power trip. By turning their airtime back on they made viewers seem important since they chose its reliability rather than just money purposes. Cablevision is becoming a monopoly so we all know that the customers were the ones affected by Cablevisions money hungry antics, so its not fair to punish the customers.  It was also a good decision because it makes them look like the bigger better person over Cablevision.  

Cablevision has been making themselves look very bad, with a lot of recent issuses they have been starting with subscriptions with other TV networks and have resulted in the pulling of programming. Cablevision had a recent issue with  the Scripps network, which is on the Food Network channel. In this sitation, similiar to the ABC dispute, Scripps pulled their programming from Cablevision. Two serious issues in such a short time looks very bad for their repuation.  That is why this recent programming issue was more of a concern for  Cablevision more than ABC. Cablevision profited  $8 billion last year, and are still charging customers obsene amounts of money, but yet still cant seem to get what they pay for. Cablevision is trying to start all of this drama with everyone's contracts and refusing to pay anymore money but yet its customers bills keep going up.  They need some serious PR work after this one!

Group Project So Far

So our group is the NJSPCA, which is the New Jersey chapter of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. This is a not for profit organization and is based out of New Brunswick. Our group assignment is to generate more awareness of the organization, and overall get more funding available. We had a little bit of a technicality the first week because we were all supposed to have met with clients and created a brief to hand in. Our client happened to be on vacation for the week we were doing the assignment, so we actually got an extension.

Since we had to complete our briefs the following week, it was a little hectic because everyone already had prior arrangements since it is spring break. We arranged to meet with our client over the phone, and had the opportunity to do our first conference call ever. I think we were pretty successful with our call, and we did get a lot of the information we needed in order to do our brief. It was very awkward at first, and we didn’t really get the proper format for a conference call, like if we all had to introduce ourselves, and we were a little unorganized with what types of questions we needed to ask the man. I think we did a good job thought and I feel like we pulled a successful conference call with the little time we prepared.

As for writing the brief, I feel like we didn’t really know what we were doing, and if our format was correct. I think what we created was a good start, but we will definitely need some editing and insight from our professor before we send the brief back to our client. I feel like the overall project is going to be fun because I really care about animals, and I like knowing that I will be learning a lot from this experience, and am finally getting a chance to do my schoolwork for real life situations. The only thing I am a little bit bummed about is that we were not assigned to create any type of event; we were assigned just to generate awareness. I feel like we will need to do some person to person situations, but I still was looking forward to actually coordinating something. But we will see!!!!!

Media Anxiety?

There are a lot of things that scare me about working with the media! I think anyone in my shoes probably feels the same way.  I am very inexperianced with all of this, considering the fact that I am a student, so all of my assignments are basically fake and I have never really gotten in touch with the media in first hand.  I think the thing I am just really scared of is that I am just going to do something to mess up and screw over either my client, or just my entire career in general.  The media is scarey becuase they are heartless out there, and you just need to try and do your best without stepping on any toes.  I just hope that I am creative enough to reach out to them and have them actually be interested in what I have to say.

 Theres so many different kinds of work that someone has to do in the PR world, and I just hope when I finally get a chance to work in this industry, that I am first broken in easy.  I want to be able to handle my clients or assignments I wouldnt say with ease, but I definitely want to feel more comfortable and confident with what I am doing, or who I am writing to.  I understand that in order to succeed you need to have a tough spine, and the only way to get that is to put yourself in those stressful situations and work throught it.  I just really want to make sure I dont mess up royaly in the beginning, becuase I feel like once I really get started and get the hang of things, I wont be so afraid and confused. 

Also, I am really horrible at creating media outlet lists.. Maybe it was just for this first client assignment we had, but I really could not figure out which sources to reach out to.  I hope that in the future when I am assigned these type of things for my job in real life, that I will be able to get more feild experiance, or understand the background of my client better, so that when I am asked to create a media outlet list, that I will not have to sit around for hours thinking of who I could possibly pitch this to.  It should come natural and obvious for who you need to speak with to get what you want, and the more you are familiar with your client.  I guess it will be easier once I get more experiance also becuase once you do it a bunch of times, you kind of have a greater understanding of who is out there, the right people to talk to, and you will begin to have established relationships with some of these people the longer you stick around.

AHa I sound like a mess and like I am afraid of everything after just re-reading this.  Hopefully I really am not the only one that feels this way!

Not SOO Scarey Movies

Soo, I went to see that new movie "The Crazies" on Friday with a friend.  I really wish I went and saw "Shutter Island" instead, I heard it was really good.  But anyways, I normally do not go to the movies too often, but when it is a scarey movie that I would like to see, I would definitely rather see it in theathers, for the big screen, and sorround sound effect, it makes it scarier!

I have to say though that yet again I am dissapointed in another not that scarey movie.  Ok, so since I was in the theater to see it, it did make me jump, but thats only because it was loud and I felt like I was in the movie with them, but this is not my idea of a scarey movie! I really am just sick of production companies overloading us with all of there trailers for all these scarey movies, making them look so good, and make you think... Oh yea this is finally going to be a good, scarey one this time! And over and over I am just dissapointed.

(If you plan on seeing "The Crazies", I don't want to ruin it for you, so just skip the next two paragraphs and go to bottom). I am just really over going to see a scarey movie, and it basically all has the same damn plot! It's always, some sort of disease or something that breaks out and makes people act all loopy, diseased, or a zombie.  This movie was yet again just like the rest of them.  People in the town were drinking the water from their main source, and only source of water supply, which was obtained from the town's big river.  Aparently some government experiment with crazy or biologically messed up people, crashed into this river, and their DNA or whatever got into the water supply, and then in return made all the people in this town become sick, which also made them crazy killers.  Of coarse the Sherrif, main character, and  his house with his wife, was at the end of town, so they were never affected by the disease, because he just happened to find out what was going on right in the knick of time!  And then one by one the town was infected, and eventually the gov't stepped into quarentine those that were affected, (but really ended up killing everyone in fear that there was a chance they were infected, and blowing up the entire town.) So to make a long story short, they escaped from the quarantine the goverment set out, and tried to flea to the next town, with obviously many difficult obsticles along the way to make it almost impossible for them to get anywhere. In the end of coarse, the movie shows them arriving to the next city, their final destiniation, and then the last 30 secs of the movie there is that UH OH cliffhanger that it ends, and you think that they never made it (in this case, it shows the goverment sattelite trigger in on them, and see they are trying to go to the city, so obviously they killed them before they got there.)

SO what I am saying is, WHYYYYY is every scarey movie lately like this? Lets see, there was Dawn of the Dead movies, Resident Evil, 28 Days Later, I Am Legend was like this also.  At least I Am Legend had a similar plot like the rest of these, but chose not to try and make it a scarey movie and more of an action movie, which in the end benefitted them becuase it was in my opinion, the best plot compared to the rest of these movies.  That brings me to add, so many of these scarey movies dont even seem believeable.  Like when they escape out of these situations, youre kind of thinking, "really?" becuase you know if they are taking this disease approach, then they want you to be under the impression that Oh My God, what if this happens in real life? But the plots are always so bad, and they get out of situations that just seem so fake, that from now on I cant take any of these movies seriously anymore.

I want to see a really scarey movie, like something that is going to make me afraid to go outside by myself.  I want to get scared the same way I did when I saw "The Ring" or "The Shining" when I was a little kid.  Whatever happened to those movies? With all these crazy people working in Hollwood, you would think someone would be creative enough to make a movie thats actually scarey, and not gross.  I think that the "Saw" movies are all good, but those are a different genre of horror to me.  Those are the suspense, but goary movies.  I am not going to go home and have a nightmare of the saw guy comming to attack me.  Two other movies that I have seen that have probably been the best scarey ones  I have seen in a while would probably have to be "The Orphan", or "Paranormal Activity".  These two movies are good in case no one has seen them, but I am still not too amazed, I am waiting for that really scarey one to come out.  If anyone has any suggestions for me then let me know!

Columbus imPRessions

First of all, I would like to mention that the Shoestring corporation listed on this page that they have created. This seems like a very promising company, and not to mention a good idea.  I like the fact that it's major purpose is to work with non-profit organizations becuase its becomming creative for a good cause.

Ok so with the Nestle Crunch Bar, I called that number and got a busy tone a few times, but I will keep trying while I write this blog entry.  I am just wondering though, who would really have found out about the hotline enough to call that number? I mean yea obviously that person who wrote all of this was easy enough to fall for this pitch, but who is to say the rest of the world will? Just because someone had a status update on Facebook, was this somebody's Facebook or was this Nestle's account? Because I do not know too many people that are going to be Nestles friend on Facebook, and just happen to check their status update in time for them to call this hotline, and even if I did see their status, I dont know if I would take it to the next level as far as actually calling the number.  Not only did they call the number, but they waited for 15 min to get ahold of something that they didnt even know what it was at first.  It doesnt seem likely that too many people are going to go about this either, unless the hotline has reached another media outlet besides Facebook.  I mean, I am writing about this and I cant even stand being put on hold, or not getting through for some sort of candy bar hotline. 

I agree that having some sort of creative funny way of representing your brand is very good for business, and it seems like this recording did an excellent job doing just that.  However, there are many other, maybe more popularly noticed ways, of establishing an image, or repuatation for your brand or client. I definitely appreciate a company with good humor, or a good vibe about them. I have noticed that companies that do more promotions, or use more attention grabbing advertising that is maybe a little on the excentric side, usually wins my vote when I decide to choose one of their products over another leading brand.

And I tried calling that number over 5 times and I never got through, so I guess ill never find out what a "nuggie" or "cootie" option was that they mentioned.... "sigh"

Bad Pitch Blog Is a BAD Blog

I really am not sure if I am too much of a fan for this site.  I feel like the information they have on here is too brief and written poorly.  I do not even understand the point they are trying to get across with some of these topics.  Although some of the topics they bring up, are interesting, they definitely could have written more about them, or at least wrote enough so the point they are trying to make, makes sense! Maybe it is just me thats not getting it, but I would say this blog is a thumbs down!

Southwest Airlines and Kevin Smith

I think that Southwest airlines handled this situation very poorly. When someone is too large to fit into a seat there could definietly be a different, and more accomidating way to approach someone in this type of ordeal.  Although Mr. Smith did claim to have bought two seats just because they were cheap and be comfortable, this means that he knew earlier he might be required to in order to fly.  In the incident where he was pushed to the next available flight, the airline was at fault because they should have been responsible enough to recognize Mr. Smith's situation, and therefore should have never recommended him to take the standby, which had just one seat available.  Mr. Smith had seen to be very happy with Southwest before the inncident, and it could have been very good business for them considering he had bought somewhere near like 10 tickets for his friends in the past week.  Southwest aparently has not appoligized to Kevin, so he says as of Monday, so this is definitely this the first step they need to take in order to change this mess.  The next thing they should do is definitely start teaching their employees most customer service training, and enable a new policy with the wieght restictions.  Possibly make it mandatory to state your weight before you can buy a ticket, so then you are informed ahead of time that double seats may be required if you are large.  Once these rules and training has gone into effect it is important to let the media know about the progress.  Kevin Smith should be given some free tickets definitelty too.  People are going to be listening to how the airline will apologize to him before the really start to make judgements about buying from them anymore.

More Publicity Stunts

There has definitelty been some crazy publicity stunts in the past, both successful and disastrous.  Hollywood uses a lot of these techniques to get publicity for a movie, or even a particular actor will portray their specific personality traits into the media somehow.  Britney Spears did the worst when she decided to shave her head.  Since she was already in the media fending off horrible rumors and accusations about herself, she did the worst by shaving her head because it just made her look super crazy, and it made more people believe that the alligations of how she was a horrible mother and that she needs to go to rehab even seem true now.  Although Britney did make the papers again and turned heads, there are better ways off getting your name out into the Hollywood scence.  Steven Colbert had a NASA space shuttle station named afterhim, The Colbert.  I am not sure who that was origionally intened to benefit, but I think the Colbert and NASA both gained attention from opposite audiences, and in a positive manor.

So besides Hollywood related stunts, because we all know they have the money and the facilites to produce some absoulte craziness, I think one really good publicity stunt that I just remembered is one that I saw first hand.  It was on a billboard out on Interstate 95 right on the outskirt of Philadelphia.  This whole strip that goes along the battleships, past the sports arenas, and is on a major highway next to a very populated city, is occupied with so much crazy advertisements.  There was even a truck, like huge 18 wheeler, hanging off the side of one of the billboards, that obviously got some attention, but the one that stuck in my head the longest was my favorite.  It was just a plain black billboard but then it had bright, bold, and angry styled font, but all in white.  The sign read,  "I HATE STEVEN SINGER", and then in small print in the corner of the billboard had ihatestevensinger.com.  There was a few times I have driven past this billboard, and each time it was with a totally different kind of group of people, and every time we drove by it somebody had to make a comment, "What is that?" or "What does that mean?" "Who is Steven Singer?".  Finally it made me so anxoius I just wanted to figure out what it meant, I mean it really could have been anything.  Instead of seeing like Steven Singer, or a comedy show or something along those lines, I looked on the website and it was nothing else but a Jewlery store! That was the last thing I expected, but the ad was very good because I am sure there are alot of people who were in the same boat as me.  I think the billboard is still out there til this day, so obviously this jewlery company is making good earnings, maybe from the billboard!

Publicity Stunts!

It is amazing, crazy, and not to mention impressive, how creative companies will get in order to promote their brands. It takes a lot of skills to come up with some of the ideas that the companies did that were successful.  I feel that the most important aspect to keep in mind when trying to pull a publicity stunt is to definitely remember the theme of the brand you are trying to promote.  The character of your business is best highlighted by the type of publicity stunt attributed to your advertising campaign.

 First of all, I had no idea that these tactics have been used in this industry for so long.  The Tour de France has been one of the most prestigious events coordinated for so long, and it is just very amusing to know that it started off as a publicity stunt.  I think that the stunts that I liked the best were the Taco Bell's April Fools' Day joke because it was very original and funny.  People were very upset about what was happening, as well as it fit the persona of Taco Bells brands.  I feel that when Burger King tried to pull off the same effect it was very cheap because the April Fool's act has already been used by a fast food place, and it was not as successful, nor did it really fit into the company's humor at the time. Plus the fact that I could not believe people really went to Burger King and got upset about not being able to order the left handed burger.  I mean, really? How stupid could you possibly be to believe this advertisement was true? I think also that the Golden Palace stunt was very creative, and it also fit into their persona as well.  An online poker company I'm sure has a lot of humor incorporated into what they represent, which is fun and entertainment and games.  I also cannot believe that Oregon really changed one of their town's names to Halfway, Oregon.  The fact that they tried to be badmouthing the company after they made a good amount of their promises to them is silly, and the town should be grateful that their town was even recognized now.  I mean it's Oregon, who else would even know that town existed if Half.com didn't come in and step up their game!?

Secondly, for the publicity stunts that were not so successful, it seemed that their failure was just a result of poor planning.  The Snapple idea was very creative and would have gotten a lot of attention, but did they really think the popsicle wouldn't melt in an 80 degree New York climate? They should have just made a plastic popsicle and handed out some free samples, because what would have even been the outcome of a real popsicle if they knew it was going to eventually melt all over the place.  No one would benefit from this, nor be happy about getting scummed on by a giant popsicle in the middle of the summer... hello bees?!? They should have learned better from the chocolate stunt failure mentioned in the beginning of this article.  Lastly, I just wanted to comment on the Pontiac incident.  The company came up with a great idea for promoting their cars, but it was a very half-way planned mistake.  Everybody knows that Oprah's show is always going to entail her giving away something great for free. It is about her, the show for sake is called Oprah! So why would Pontiac try and establish credibility for this act on this show? They should have chosen another show that was not directed so much toward one person.  Also, the only part of their stunt were they could have claimed some dominance for their brand, they messed it up because the cars weren't even on the market yet.  This could have been a great idea if it was done differently.

I Hate the Winter

I am sure that since the holidays are all over that we are all starting to get a little sick and tired or warming up our cars every time we want to get in them, shoveling snow, black ice, and every other last bit of the freezing, bitter months of winter.  Well keep on your jackets because bad news has just arrived. Our buddy Phil out in Punxsutawney Pennsylvania, yea thats right the groundhog, has just seen his shadow! This means that there will be another six weeks of winter!  Let me just add that I had no idea until this morning that I remembered it was Groundhog's Day, that I learned something new about this special little event.  It is actually a Chrisitian holiday called Candlemas, becuase this is when Mary brought Jesus unto the holy place, when he was only six weeks old for all to see.  Hence the six weeks similarities, ( I never knew that and I at least think that is really cool).  This is probably the only thing I was happy about was that I learned something new, but besides that, I really hate winter and I am very bitter about having to deal with an extra six weeks of it.  Just when you think it is gettting darker out a little bit later than normal, and the few more weeks of the freezing cold just arent as bad anymore, news like this strikes out and you have to suffer again.  I cant wait for the end of March when things become a little more pleasant.  On top of it all, I feel that Montclair State is so much colder than any other place in New Jersey, or at least ten degrees colder and windier than anywhere else, so all of us who go to school here are going to have to deal with the negative degrees below zero wind tunnel for a couple more months now.  I might consider hibernating ore moving to an island for those extra six weeks, but maybe one day in a perfect world it will happen!

Twitter Tweet Twittering...

     I have to be honest when I say that I have never joined the Tweeting community nor have I ever even checked out this new phenomenon to see if I would even be interested in it.  I feel as if the more people talk about Twitter, the more I am opposed to start using it.  This is because I am not exactly sure of what the purpose of Twitter really is.  Why use this website when Facebook is that plus so much more? Honestly, I have over 1,000 friends that everyone I know is on Facebook.  Even if i did decide to set up a Twitter account, I would not even know who has one that would become one of my followers.  Facebook offers status updates like Twitter, but also pictures, events, groups, etc. It is easier to go about networking on Facebook because I feel it is much more established, credible and has millions of more users than that of Twitter.  I feel that this is the same opinion that many of other web users have who are not joining the Twitter community.  It would definitely have been more popular if this site was launched before Facebook's takeover, but since it didn't, it seems to me as if it is almost just a cheap knockoff.


I think that Twitter had become more popular at certain times becuase people were interested to see what the site was all about, set up accounts, and then were never to use them again.  Not meaning to knock this site down too much becuase I do feel like it is starting to come back a little bit more recently.  There are certain news topics, such as Haiti, or other uprising organizations that have gone about making Twitter one of their main methods of promotion.  This leads me to believe that Twitter may be better than Facebook in a way that is geared for more business related purposes.  It is easy to track down a busniess or organization's status using Twitter because it doesnt give too many details and distractions that the same company would have using a Facebook page.  I feel that if Twitter was used for more organizations, busniesses or important figures rather than socializing then it definitely has not peaked yet.  I just feel that Twitter needs a little more time for it's credibility to be established, and webusers need more time to internalize the benefits this website has to offer. People like me need to accept the fact that Twitter is around and could potentially be something of use, especially in my feild of PR.

My First Post

Hello Everyone,

I just created this new blog earlier today.  I never knew how creative you are aloud to get with these things, with all the bright colors n such. My name is Nicole Ellis, and I am a 21 year old junior at Montclair State University. I have been into communications for about 4 years now including community college, and then Montclair. We have had to do a lot of work with blogs and online diaries in the past, but it seems like this school is very much into it in the communications classes.   I created two other blogs last semester for a group project my class had with URI communication students.  I just created this blog for another class called Public Relations Writing.  I am excited to take this class because I am finally starting to take classes that are geared more towards my major.  I am hoping I will gain more of an understanding of what I want to do inside the PR field, as well as getting to know more opportunities that are ahead of me.  I expect my writing to improve tremendously in many different ways, and I will feel more confident when I have more writing assignments ahead of me in this feild.  In this blog I will most likely be discussing assigned topics that will be about Public Relations subjects, as well as many current events that involve PR work, so this should be an interesting blog to keep up with.  Hope to be hearing from everyone soon!