Community-Engaged Fall Marketing Initiative Program Underway [09/13/2007]

by Kimberly Landon

This community-engaged program pairs six community organizations with six student teams to create unique public relations campaigns that target each organization’s key audience.

Since 2003, College of Mass Communications’ Professors Derina Holtzhausen and Kelly Werder have offered their Public Relations students a unique learning experience through the Marketing Initiative program. This community-engaged service-learning program pairs non-profit and community organizations with student teams to create unique public relations campaigns that target each organization’s key audience. The project creates a win-win situation - students have an opportunity to use what they have learned in class and gain some real world experience working with a client, while the organizations get a personalized strategic marketing plan for a fraction of what it would cost them to hire a public relations consultant.

In the beginning, only USF departments used this program to assist them with their campaigns. However, over the last five years the Marketing Initiative has expanded its reach to work with numerous clients, including the Special Olympics, the City of Clearwater, Florida Kinship Center, and Toyota of Tampa Bay. Each client organization has had its own problems and challenges to which the students have given useable solutions.

Six organizations were chosen for the Fall 2007 Marketing Initiative program. They include the Tampa Marine Institute, USF’s department of Industrial and Management Systems Engineering, the Southwest Florida Water Management District, the Osher at USF, the Prosperity Campaign of Hillsborough County and the USF School Garden Research Group. Each organization provided a problem statement and set some goals for their campaign and the students will do their best to solve the problem and achieve the organization’s goals. To cover costs, each organization contributes $500 for the students to use for research and the creation of campaign materials.

• The Tampa Marine Institute (TMI) is an alternative education program that has been successfully rehabilitating Hillsborough County’s troubled teens since 1972. Their mission is to help their students become responsible and productive members of the community. Through the marketing initiative, TMI is hoping to increase public awareness of the Institute and its mission and to create a broader network and funding base in the Tampa Bay community.

• The Department of Industrial and Management Systems Engineering (IMSE) offers students a doctoral program, three masters programs and a bachelors program. IMSE would like to increase the quality and quantity of the undergraduate students in the program. Through the marketing initiative, they hope to produce a strategy and marketing materials that can be implemented and disseminated to potential undergraduate students.

• The Southwest Florida Water Management District seeks to educate students about the importance of water conservation and watershed protection. Through this program they seek to create a strategy to target college students to help them to adopt water-conserving behaviors and cut down on their overall water usage.

• The Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI) is part of Educational Outreach’s Division of Continuing Education at USF and offers educational opportunities by and for older adults. The goal of OLLI is to develop a new image that communicates who they are and what they do. They would also like to tie together their marketing and recruiting efforts so that they reflect the values and character of the organization.

• The mission of the Prosperity Campaign of Hillsborough County is to promote and expand economic and asset-building opportunities for low and moderate income working families. The goals they hope to achieve through the initiative are to increase name recognition, increase service utilization among their target audience, and to increase volunteer recruitment.

• The USF School Garden Research Group helps Hillsborough County schools build gardens to teach students about nature, gardening and nutrition. They want to increase awareness of the program among Hillsborough County schools by building a virtual community where teachers can learn more about the gardening program and which schools participate in it.

This semester the student teams will be presenting their projects at the “Spotlight Gala” to be held on December 14, from 6-9 p.m. This Gala is designed to showcase all of the campaigns the students worked on during the semester. All clients as well as students and their families are invited to attend this event.

Any organization interested in participating in the Spring 2008 Marketing Initiative can contact the USF Collaborative for Children, Families and Communities at Jetson@usfcollab.usf.edu or (813) 974-7318 for details on the application process and program deadlines.

About the USF Collaborative for Children, Families & Communities The USF Collaborative is a recognized central point of contact, facilitator and matchmaker for new partnerships between University faculty and students, nationally known researchers, local government, service organizations and professionals to build a better Tampa Bay community. For more information about the Collaborative and its programs, visit http://www.usfcollab.usf.edu or contact the Collaborative director, Judi Jetson, at 813-974-7318, or Jetson@usfcollab.usf.edu.