Unit convenor and teaching staff |
Unit convenor and teaching staff
Unit Convenor/Tutor
Raymond Welling
Contact via Email
Y3A 165B
Please email for an appointment
Tutor
Tanya Muscat
Please email for an appointment
Stephen Collins
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Credit points |
Credit points
3
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Prerequisites |
Prerequisites
MAS389
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Corequisites |
Corequisites
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Co-badged status |
Co-badged status
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Unit description |
Unit description
The objective of this unit is to develop practical public relations (PR) skills, including: strategy writing, budgeting and professional presentation. Students work in groups as small PR agencies pitching for business of either commercial or non-profit organisations. The unit offers real-life case studies as well as a possibility of the best proposed ideas to be taken up by client organisations. It is expected that students use the knowledge acquired in MAS389 and that all the assessments in this unit answer to professional industry standards. The unit develops critical, analytical and creative thinking skills and further develops students' effective communication capabilities.
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Information about important academic dates including deadlines for withdrawing from units are available at https://www.mq.edu.au/study/calendar-of-dates
On successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:
Name | Weighting | Hurdle | Due |
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Weekly Insights & Impact | 25% | No | Weeks 1-6 |
PR Strategy Report | 35% | No | Week 8, Fri Oct 6, 11.59pm |
PR Strategy Pitch | 30% | No | Weeks 11, 12 and 13 |
Tutorial Participation | 10% | No | Ongoing |
Due: Weeks 1-6
Weighting: 25%
Every week from week 1 to week 6 you are required to respond to a set of weekly reflection questions. These questions are designed to help you connect your readings, the lectures and any extra research you conduct with your specific team project and help you develop a solid basis for your strategy. The questions are:
Each week’s submission should be 300-400 words. They may include dot points, and should be succinct, clear and professional in style.
These insights will be used as the basis for your weekly 'reflection huddles' with your teams in tutorials (see 'Participation' assessment below) and are designed to help drive your team project forward. As such, they are to be written for the benefit of your own learning as well as to share key insights, ideas, and concerns with your team. Where relevant include references and links to online sources so team members and the tutor can easily find the relevant articles, videos, podcasts or other resources you may refer to. Any extra resources you find will ideally also useful for including in your final strategy.
Your insights are to be submitted to an online blog within ilearn at least 24 hours before your next tutorial. Your tutor will make a note of your timely contributions. As well as assessing your engagement with the lectures and readings, your tutor will use these insights to monitor your team's progress and use them as the basis for mentoring and for assisting with difficulties during your in-class meetings. Your 5 submissions will be marked holistically after Week 6.
Marking criteria
Engagement with course material: Evidence of thorough engagement with set readings and lectures over the 6 weeks.
Insightfulness: Points from the readings and lectures and questions are strategically selected and linked to your project to help propel your team work and project work forward.
Expression: The language is clearly and succinct, free from grammatical and spelling errors. It is easy for team members and the tutor to follow and motivating in tone. If dot-points are used, they are well formulated.
Referencing: Full and correct referencing (Harvard style). Includes references for set texts, lectures and relevant websites. (References will not be included in the word count)
Due: Week 8, Fri Oct 6, 11.59pm
Weighting: 35%
The assignment requires you to work in a small group as a PR consultancy to develop a comprehensive communications plan (PR strategy) for your client. Your strategy report will include sections on your organisation's background, purpose/vision, key issues, key publics, goals and objectives, key messages, tactics, evaluation, timeline, and budget. At the beginning of the document also include a page introducing your agency, its members and their specialisations (indicating which sections they worked on).
Sample mock-ups of media releases, website designs, social media posts, bios of spokespeople, brochures etc. as appropriate can be included in an appendix and will not be included in the word limit. Only include original material in the appendix and make sure anything included is referred to in the body of your strategy report.
Through discussion and negotiation at team meetings, you will work with your team members to negotiate and divide responsibility for its various components.i.e. while you are encouraged to work closely together on all sections, you will have primary responsibility for particular sections. You are expected to take into account each individual member's strengths and ensure fair distribution of tasks. You will receive an individual mark for sections you contribute to the report, but this mark will be tightly connected with the overall group effort. Your name should be included under the sub-heading for each of the sections for which you are responsible.
Lectures and tutorials will cover the type of content that needs to appear in a PR strategy document and you will have a chance to workshop and plan sections of the report in class.
As a whole, the report should have a consistent style throughout. To achieve this, you may discuss and agree to follow a particular style guide, and one student may be responsible for giving the entire document a final edit.
While you may experience difficulties in the course of working with others, it is part of the experience to develop skills in negotiation and leadership as you try and overcome difficulties and achieve a positive outcome for all. Where possible raise any issues with your tutor as soon as possible - they are there to help and mentor you through team-based issues as well as on the development of content.
Your mark will be based on how well you are able to deliver your sections of the report, including appropriate content, creative solutions to the communication problem, clarity of expression, use of salient theory, research and/or comparative case studies that are well-referenced to back up your choices, and effective design and layout that melds well with the rest of the report's content and style. The document is expected to meet professional standards.
After receiving feedback from your tutor on your marked report, you are expected to update your report and provide a clean copy to your client and tutor at the presentation. Your final report will be examined for its professional style as part of your presentation mark. Your one-paragraph overview on what you have updated in your section in light of feedback from the tutor will also be considered as part of your presentation mark (see further details under 'PR Strategy Pitch' below).
This report should be a maximum of 3,000 words, with each student responsible for a roughly equal number words. The language should be extremely tight. If you are having difficulties with the word length, speak to your tutor for further advice well prior to submission.
Marking criteria:
Each team member should submit the entire team's strategy report to Turnitin. Your name should appear clearly under each sub-heading for which you were responsible. You will receive individual feedback on your sections, what you can work on to improve these sections for your final submission to the client, and on how well your parts fit with the whole report. (Note: you will likely receive a 100% matching report from Turnitin given that you will be uploading the same document as your colleagues. There is no need to worry about this. Markers will, however, look at the originality reports for sections that may have been copied from other sources).
Due: Weeks 11, 12 and 13
Weighting: 30%
In week 11 or 12, your consultancy will present your PR strategy to your client. Your goal is to convince your client that the strategy you have put together will solve the communication challenges they are currently facing and your team will provide the best possible results for them.
All team members are expected to have a speaking role and members should work together to ensure smooth and logical links between each speaker. You will receive an individual mark for the presentation, though it will be strongly linked to how well you come across as a team.
The presentation should be 15 minutes long in total, with each student speaking for approximately 3 minutes depending on group size). It is up to you how you design the presentation in terms of whether each speaker speaks once or in coordinated way that involves multiple shorter sections for each speaker - whichever you think will be more engaging and easily digestible for your audience.
Note that this time is short and you may not have time to cover everything you have in your written document, so you will have to be highly strategic in selecting the most important and innovative aspects that will make your team stand out. You may tell the client where to look in the report for further details.
You are encouraged to use images and short videos where appropriate to help enable your client to visualise your strategy.
The formal presentation will be followed by 3-5 minutes of questions from the client.
During the presentation you will present your final hard-copy strategy report to the client. One student is also required to provide a soft copy of your group's written report either via USB provided of by Dropbox [Titled: Client name - your team members first names].This report should be updated based on feedback on your marked report. As part of the presentation mark, your final team report will be examined for its professional style and physical attractiveness.
The client will also provide feedback on your presentation and report, which will be taken into account when providing feedback on your presentation and deciding on your final mark.
All students should upload a copy of their section of the final presentation slides in PDF format to Turnitin by 5pm on the Monday following their presentation (i.e. just after your presentation in week 11 or 12). These slides should contain one additional slide at the beginning where your briefly explain what you changed to your section of your written report as a result of feedback from the tutor, along with another slide containing a few dot point reflections on how you felt your presentation with the client went (e.g., what did you and your team did well, what aspects the client seemed most engaged with, what could have been improved to better connect with and impress your client) as well as how you felt about the whole process of working with the client over the semester and what you learned about PR work.
Feedback by the tutor on your contribution to the presentation will be provided on Turnitin.
Marking criteria:
All of these aspects will be weighted evenly.
Due: Ongoing
Weighting: 10%
You will be marked on the consistency and quality of your oral contributions to in-class meetings with your team as well as whole class discussions and activities. This mark will include contributions made as part of your weekly 'huddle reflections' where you discuss issues arising from the written weekly insights on the lectures, readings and project work.
Marking criteria:
Understanding and application: You demonstrate a deep understanding of pertinent MAS390 concepts and an ability to apply them appropriately and creatively to cases and campaigns in class discussions.
Attitude: You demonstrate a strong motivation to engage with team members, fellow classmates and the tutor in a positive manner. You show interest in engaging with the client project as well as other case studies.
Consistency of contribution: You consistently engage in the process of learning in both small group and whole class discussions throughout the semester.
Lectures run from weeks 1-12. The lectures for this unit will be supplemented by pre-recorded lectures presented by highly engaging industry experts that are available on iLearn. You should listen to the pre-recorded lectures at least 2 days before your class. Your insights on the lectures in Weeks 1-6 will be directly assessed as part of your 'Weekly Insights and Impact' assessment (due 24 hours before class in weeks 2-7), while your reflections on other lectures will contribute to your participation mark.
Tutorials
You are required to attend a 1-hour tutorial each week.
Tutorials begin in week 1. It is essential that you attend from Week 1 as teams will be formed in the first week. You will be assigned a client and your tutor will provide an initial overview of the client's communication issue to get you started on your group project.
Tutorials will consist of intensive incubation meetings where you will be able to work on your team projects, apply different skills, and analyse a range of cases. Most weeks, you will have the opportunity to engage in a 10-minute 'reflection huddle' with your team members where you will discuss key insights and reflections arising from the readings and lectures and as part of the 'Weekly Insights and Impact' assessment. There will also be set activities designed to help you acquire a particular skill or apply it to your project. Time in class may be used to assign roles and tasks among team members for the coming week.
Your tutor will move from group to group and will provide oral feedback on your work-in-progress and help mentor you through any issues that arise.
Client meetings
Your tutor will set you up with relevant contact details for your client and it will be your team's responsibility to arrange meetings with the client.
It is suggested that one person in each team is selected to be the client liaison. They will be expected to make initial email contact with the client by Week 3.
It is essential that by the end of Week 4, you have attended a formal briefing session with your client (the earlier the better). While you will come to the meeting having already done extensive desk-based research into your client (e.g. looked at their website, media reports etc.), in this meeting you will gain a deeper understanding of them and their organisational goals. It will be your chance to clarify their communication needs (e.g. What is the issue? Who are they trying to reach out to? With what message? Why?).
The intention is that the briefing meetings will be arranged during class time in weeks 3 and 4, but the meeting may need to occur at another time/date that suits the client. If not during class time, the meeting may be on campus or on the client's premises as negotiated with the client. Face-to-face or Skype meetings are acceptable. Ideally all team members will be at the meeting.
If you are having trouble contacting your client please let you tutor know as early as possible. There may be one or two cases where the client will be away on business for several weeks. In known cases, your tutor or the convenor will let you know and will 'act' as the client while they are away.
Presentations to clients will be held in normal tutorial times in weeks 11 and 12 on campus. This is where you present your team's polished written strategy report and pitch for their business.
Out-of-class commitment
MAS390 is a 3 credit point unit. This means that you should allocate 10 hours of study per week in addition to your weekly classes (including non-teaching weeks). Part of this time will consist of reading of set texts, engaging with both live and online lectures, researching for your project, and writing, while part of the time should involve collaboration with team members on the project, including liaising with the client. While you will have some time in class to meet, discuss, and work on your strategy with you team members, you will likely need more time to work directly with your team members outside of tutorials. This may be done face-to-face or via collaborative online tools.
Required Readings
The required readings will be available electronically on iLearn under the weekly topics as well as via the library's database and eReserve.
Emails
Generally student emails will be replied to within 48 business hours. Students should not expect emails to be returned on weekends and after hours.
Students should ensure that they can receive emails sent to their MQ email addresses.
This unit will make extensive use of iLearn https://ilearn.mq.edu.au/. Required readings, comprehensive information on assessment tasks, important announcements will be posted to iLearn. Make sure you check iLearn and your Macquarie University email account regularly during this unit.
For technical support go to: http://mq.edu.au/about_us/offices_and_units/informatics/help
For student quick guides on the use of iLearn go to: http://mq.edu.au/iLearn/student_info/guides.htm
Weekly Schedule (for weekly readings and detail of online lectures, please refer to iLearn)
Week 1 Introduction to PR strategies
Week 2 Laying the groundwork
Week 3 Planning and research
Week 4 Get SMART - Connecting communications to measurable business outcomes
Week 5 Making it meaningful
Week 6 Using social media
Week 7 Good is the new cool - Corporate social responsibility and pro-bono campaigns
Week 8 Working for a Global PR Firm
Week 9 Presenting with passion
Week 10 Government and community relations
Weeks 11 & 12 Presentations to clients
Week 13 Careers - Building a PR resume
Macquarie University policies and procedures are accessible from Policy Central. Students should be aware of the following policies in particular with regard to Learning and Teaching:
Academic Honesty Policy http://mq.edu.au/policy/docs/academic_honesty/policy.html
Assessment Policy http://mq.edu.au/policy/docs/assessment/policy_2016.html
Grade Appeal Policy http://mq.edu.au/policy/docs/gradeappeal/policy.html
Complaint Management Procedure for Students and Members of the Public http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/complaint_management/procedure.html
Disruption to Studies Policy (in effect until Dec 4th, 2017): http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/disruption_studies/policy.html
Special Consideration Policy (in effect from Dec 4th, 2017): https://staff.mq.edu.au/work/strategy-planning-and-governance/university-policies-and-procedures/policies/special-consideration
In addition, a number of other policies can be found in the Learning and Teaching Category of Policy Central.
Macquarie University students have a responsibility to be familiar with the Student Code of Conduct: https://students.mq.edu.au/support/student_conduct/
Results shown in iLearn, or released directly by your Unit Convenor, are not confirmed as they are subject to final approval by the University. Once approved, final results will be sent to your student email address and will be made available in eStudent. For more information visit ask.mq.edu.au.
Assessment tasks are aligned to the unit Learning Outcomes. Timely submission of assessment tasks is a unit requirement or penalties apply.
Tasks 10% or less. No extensions will be granted. Students who have not submitted the task prior to the deadline will be awarded a mark of 0 for the task, except for cases in which an application for Disruption to Studies is made and approved.
Tasks above 10%. No extensions will be granted. Students who submit late work without an extension will receive a penalty of 10% per day (including weekends). This penalty does not apply for cases in which an application for Disruption to Studies is made and approved.
You are required to attend all tutorials. As participation in the process of learning is linked to and underpins the unit Learning Outcomes, you will need to either apply for Disruptions to Studies to cover any missed tutorial (if the disruption is greater than three consecutive days) or supply appropriate documentation to your unit convenor for any missed tutorial (if less than three consecutive days).
MMCCS Session Re-mark Application http://www.mq.edu.au/pubstatic/public/download/?id=167914
Information is correct at the time of publication
Macquarie University provides a range of support services for students. For details, visit http://students.mq.edu.au/support/
Learning Skills (mq.edu.au/learningskills) provides academic writing resources and study strategies to improve your marks and take control of your study.
http://students.mq.edu.au/support/
Students with a disability are encouraged to contact the Disability Service who can provide appropriate help with any issues that arise during their studies.
For all student enquiries, visit Student Connect at ask.mq.edu.au
For help with University computer systems and technology, visit http://www.mq.edu.au/about_us/offices_and_units/information_technology/help/.
When using the University's IT, you must adhere to the Acceptable Use of IT Resources Policy. The policy applies to all who connect to the MQ network including students.
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