Josh

I think what the Salvation Army does for the less fortunate people goes above and beyond the call of duty.  The Salvation Army  is a great organization and they usually find creative ways for you to donate time, money, food or clothing. 

There most recent campaign is called the Red Kettle Campaign.  They partnered with Wal-Mart to launch this campaign.  According to the PR Newswire, “The Red Kettle Christmas Campaign enables the Army to provide food, toys and clothing to over 6 million people during the Christmas season and helps more than 34 million Americans recovering from all kinds of personal disasters nationwide.”  According to the Salvation Army website, there are three different types of kettles for purchase.   

• Personal Kettle-This is done by the normal individual who feels they can help a family or someone in need during the season.  You can fill your kettle with secure online donations. 
• Group Kettle-as a civic group, school, or any other organization you can host your own online Group Kettle. A Group Kettle allows your members to fundraise independently with their own Personal Kettles yet all kettle donations will also be reflected automatically in your Group Kettle.
• Business Kettles-This is where your business can host a kettle and put it on their website where they can allow employees to participate if they wish.

All deductions toward this campaign are 100% tax deductible and wherever you are hosting the kettle, all that money raised goes towards your community.  According to the PR Newswire, this is the Salvation Army’s most prominent fund-raising campaign.  “In 2004,the campaign raised over $100 million in communities nationwide, with the nickels, dimes, quarters and dollars all remaining in the towns where the money was deposited into the kettles.  The funds raised help support many of the 37 million people in poverty who turn to the Army for food and toys at Christmas, utility and homeless assistance, senior and child care, drug abuse treatment and many other social service needs.”

With the Salvation Army at the top of their game, many people will be left with food and clothing for the holiday season.  And for most people, this is the Greatest Gift of all.
 

Yesterday one of my teachers gave us a sheet to pass around and she wanted to know what we all had left in terms of projects for the semester. For some reason, I am thinking she might be thinking of cancelling hers because of all the projects the students in my class have. I think that is just wishful thinking though. Never in my life have I been so stressed about finishing a semester. I mean I know that I will get it done sometime, but when I do get it done, I will be extremely happy. I just remember freshman and sophomore year in college thinking how hard it was to write a two-page paper and then be done for the semester. Now, I only wish I could do that. I am very interested in what I am doing, so that will make the project process a lot easier.

Back in high school, things were much easier.  But just like with everything, you don’t realize it till 5 years later.  High school was so routine for me and everything seemed to fall into place.  I never really had to worry about anything.  Right now though, I seem to be worrying about everything.  However, this past weekend and this coming up weekend was and will be incredible.  First off, on Friday it will be my 22nd birthday.  Unlucky timing with the Iron Bowl, but that will make for one killer party hopefully.  

Since I was five, I have watched the Iron Bowl every year.  It is the one game I know I have watched Auburn play every year.  This year will be no different.  I feel a little sad, this being my last home game as a student, but it is definitely time to move on.  I have been applying for some jobs after a graduate just to see what happens and see if I can get early acceptance possibly.    

One thing I am ready for is Thanksgiving.  My favorite holiday.  The food is awesome and just to take a break feels great.  This year, I will be working on my projects, so not every part will be fun.  But enough of me complaining.  I have to start working on some homework. 

So I have mentioned before in one of my earlier posts at the beginning of the year how I was going to intern in the Media Relations Department at the Athletic Department here at Auburn University.  Well I have been trying to contact the person that I would be doing my internship with, and things haven’t been working out as planned for many different reasons.  One is I feel like they don’t really accept the opportunity for interns.  They want students who will be there for a couple of years getting to know the system.  This is understandable.  I just wish I would have known that two years ago.  Well I have always had a second option just in case this one fell through.

Before I mention what that is let me go ahead and tell you what I have been doing the past couple months.  I have been trying to decide, just like many of my other fellow classmates, what kinds of jobs I want to look for upon graduation.  I know in PR, just like with most jobs, you don’t want to limit yourself in your job search.  But for me, I have to have some career path in line.  I evaluated myself and I know there are three things that I do well and want to do something with these for the beginning of my career.  These three things are sports, children, and working well with people. 

Now to my other opportunity.  It is working with the non-profit, Storybook Farms, the organization that specializes in fundraising, public speaking, newsletters, and keeping their name in the community.  Above all, Storybook offers therapeutic horseback riding for children with life-threatening diseases, or who have suffered a loss. 

PR for me means building and maintaining relationships with people.  I feel like I can do better at Storybook because I feel like I can get more hands on experience working with something small.  Isn’t that what an internship is supposed to do?  Give you real-life experience?  I know that I want to work with kids and eventually maybe own and run and successful camp.  I believe this is a start.  So going with Storybook Farms right now seems like a great option.   

 

 

Today I am going to talk about a show that I have been watching since when it started. It is a feel-good show so if you are ever in one of those moods where nothing seems right, I would definitely watch this show. My roommate says it is just like Extreme Home Makeover, but I tend to disagree. Three Wishes is a show that shows much more variety than Extreme Makeover. What I mean by that is that Three Wishes doesn’t just build houses. This show grants three wishes to three people in a different small town each week. This show comes on Friday night and Amy Grant is the host. Watching this show makes me wonder what I would do with one wish. Growing up I had a speech impediment. Kids I would say are so harsh. I was made fun of in elementary school all the time because I could not say a sentence without stuttering. Well, I got help and now, for the most part I am stutter free.

Now you are probably wondering why in the world I decided to mention this right in the middle of me talking about Three Wishes. Well probably the most memorable event on that show happened a couple of weeks ago with a college student named Anthony who had the same problem I did, except that he was much older. His mom made the wish for him to become stutter free so he could run for president of his college. Well fortunately for him, Three Wishes decided to take on this project and they implanted a device in his ear to help him with his speech impediment. It was a miracle how well he could talk with that device. It was very moving for the parents to see and for his fellow classmates to watch him deliver his speech. He remarked in his speech that he was a living testament that dreams do come true.

There are many other memorable wishes that were given on this show. Honoring soldiers, firefighters, giving a dying father’s his last wish for his children to not have any financial problems. The possibilities are endless with this show, and every week it seems to surprise me even more. Needless to say I do tape this show because on a Friday night I am usually out or not around a television to watch a show like this. So every Sunday, my roommate and I sit around the television and watch a show that changes many people’s lives. So I ask you this…If you had one wish, what would it be?

“I’ll be back!” That is a famous saying most of us grew up with while watching the Terminator when we were younger. I know that phrase will be recognized by our generation for the rest of our lives. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the current governor of California, and former actor, is playing the public relations game himself now too. According to PR Newswire, Schwarzenegger and the California Travel and Tourism Commission and California’s world-class ski destinations have teamed up for the first time to launch the California Snow Campaign aimed at increasing destination skier visits and making the Golden State top-of-mind as a premier ski destination.

There is a multitude of public relations and marketing going on in this campaign. There are also many marketing strategies and tactics that go along with the California Snow Campaign, including a commercial featuring Schwarzenegger skiing, as well as a welcome from some of the best boarders and skiers in California. “There’s also a national media relations and advertising (print and broadcast) program, Internet and e-mail programs, cross-marketing opportunities with United Airlines and Southwest Airlines, as well as consumer ski shows in London and throughout the United States, where California ski packages and merchandise will be given away, “according to the Newswire.

This shows that Schwarzenegger is committed to the overall beauty and success of the state of California. This shows his added support of the tourism in California and his promotion to the good wealth of the great state. Tourism is a huge industry in California and generates a lot of money. Last year travel and tourism expenditures totaled $82.5 billion in California, supported jobs for nearly 900,000 Californians and generated $5.2 billion in state and local tax revenues. So why not have a campaign to boost more revenue on an already thriving industry. The campaign will begin in November starting with the commercial mentioned before. According to the PR Newswire, “The campaign’s official call to action is the new California Snow Web site, Visit California where visitors can view the “director’s cut” of the commercial, peruse the biographies of ski talent appearing in the spot, pinpoint and research statistics about California’s world-class resorts, as well as ski against the Governor in an interactive online game.”

Arnold has done it again not only succeeding in the movies, but exceeding in public relations. His face helps to improve the state that has supposedly done well under his leadership.

So this weekend was yet another interesting weekend.  Let’s see where do I begin.  Maybe I should begin on last Thursday.  The feature writing class took a field trip to the Civil Rights Institute in Birmingham, Ala, and also visited 16th St. Baptist Church.  This baptist church is where four young girls died when a bomb went off in the church during a church service.  The white man was later prosecuted and found guilty.  This experience was a very interesting experience.  Overall, the day was long and tiring, and to be completely honest, I was ready to get home as soon as possible.  

On Friday, I went back to my hometown to work on a haunted trail at my camp that I worked at over the summer.  I was the tour guide so I had to come up with a scary story that dealt with the strange occurences of the trail and cabins I was leading the kids through.  There were about 50 kids at the lock-in, so I had to take them in groups of three down the trail.  It was very long and I did not return to Auburn until about four Saturday morning.  The football game was at 11:30 so I only got a couple hours of sleep and was extremely exhausted.  The reason I drove back is because I knew I would have to wake up really early to make it back to Auburn with all of the football traffic.

Now for Saturday.  The game was fun.  We absolutely demolished Ole Miss.  I think a lot had to do with the fact that we had just lost a heartbreaker to LSU the week before and our players had some unfinished business.  The most important event of the weekend was the Halloween party my roommate and I had after the football game that night.  Most people dressed up, but some did not and that was fine.  I on the other hand did dress up.  My roommate was a Desperate Housewife and I was a pumpkin.  Originally I was going to be Napoleon Dynamite from the movie, but popular demand told me to be the pumpkin.  Dressed in my Speedos and Pumpkin attire, with nothing but that on, I was ready to go.  The night was a lot of fun.  Many of this class came to visit me and the party we had.  The Blues Brother and I went to Waffle House at about four so I did not get back to bed until about five that morning.  Very fun weekend, hopefully everyone had fun as well.

I am going to talk about one of the public relations campaigns that I did a report on last year in school.  One of the most recognized and successful campaigns in advertising history is the small figure made of white dough and wears a baker’s cap known as Poppin’ Fresh.  However, many people do not know the official name Poppin’ Fresh, and instead know him by the Pillsbury Doughboy.  According to the website Advertising Age-The Advertising Century, Rudy Perz, a creative director for Leo Burnett advertising agency, in 1965, “dreamed up the idea of a plump, dough figure, that would pop out of a tube of refrigerated rolls.”  Pillsbury merged with General Mills in the early 21st century and from there, became a very powerful organization.  General Mills makes products such as cereals, meals, snacks and baking products.  All different kinds of brands fall under General Mills, such as Cheerios, Hamburger Helper, Yoplait, and Chex Mix.  Pillsbury, a part of General Mills, is most famous for the Pillsbury Doughboy. The Pillsbury Doughboy has been around since 1965 and has always been associated with baking products and his trademark laugh.

One strength aspect, I believe, would be General Mills has successful campaigns such as Betty Crocker and the Jolly Green Giant.  There are many different levels of management in the organization.  An extensive board of directors is extremely diverse and allows for different points of views to be discussed.  The culture of General Mills focuses on the thoughts viewpoints of others. Public relations are responsible for three main programs to enable growth within the organization according to the General Mills website.  Building a brand, leading a team and running a business are the three parts to the public relations and marketing aspect of this company.  To be successful all of these programs must be working.  The Pillsbury Doughboy campaign would define public relations as getting the message across to convey to the publics on the General Mills brands especially Pillsbury.  General Mills has a wide-ranging media center and a comprehensive investor site to allow a successful public relations program to work.

Above all, the Pillsbury Doughboy campaign was an overall success and generated huge revenue for the company.  General Mills is a highly respected organization and because of the Pillsbury Doughboy campaign, the name will be recognized.  For 40 years, the little doughboy named Poppin’ Fresh has popped out of a can and entertained the consumers for years.  I hope that for the next 40 years this will continue to happen. 

In one of my classes here at Auburn, I have to be a mentor to a high school student at Loachapoka High School.  The high school is extremely small and is in a small city outside Auburn.  The city is Loachapoka, Ala.  Each of my classmates are assigned a Tiger Cub to work with throughout the semester on writing skills, such as writing feature articles, stories and all different types of grammar exercises.  We have had only two meetings so far, but I can tell this is going to be a wonderful experience.  My student’s name is Danje and she is great.  Yesterday she had to interview me, and she did great.  I could tell she had interviewed people before.  She had interviewed people for a number of different stories she had done.  She is only 16 years old and she has had experience that I did not get until college.  

I then went on to interview her, and my questions were much harder to answer because I wanted to find out as much as I could about my cub.  After our session, she asked me if I wanted to take a tour of the school with a couple of the other people.  I wanted to because I have never seen this school before and I was very intrigued at its size.  My old school was very different from this one in terms of population and size, being much bigger.  She took me through the school and told me all the small stories this school shares.  I could tell it felt good for her to give a tour because she felt very important.  

Coming up on my last stop of the room was the band room.  These students at Loachapoka are in love with music.  Most of the students are in the band and it is their life.  Everything centers around the band.  A few of the Auburn students and myself got treated to a very special treat at the end of the day.  They wanted to play for us in their small band equipment room.  So they did and it was awesome.  We are going on a field trip on Thursday to Birmingham, Ala. to the Civil Rights Institute.  I’m sure it will be special due to the fact that Rosa Parks has just died.

To be a professional athlete, one must realize that he or she automatically becomes a role model for millions of people. To be an athlete on a professional sports team comes with many responsibilities. Yet for some, being professional does not matter to them. I was watching ESPN the other day during College Football Saturday and an interesting topic began to be discussed that I had not yet heard about, but think it is terrible that it happened. The Minnesota Vikings allegedly were involved in a party on a boat last week and now are facing many charges.

For those of you who haven’t heard about this story, the Vikings went on a chartered cruise and there are now allegations that the boat was turned into a “sex” boat with many inappropriate behaviors going on, some of them being illegal. According to Minnesota Public Radio, Attorney Stephen Doyle, who is investigating these actions, said that 20 or more Vikings players were said to be on the boat. “Imagine a 250 pound or 300 pound guy inviting a 90-pound, 100-pound waitress to dance for them as she’s just watched him perform various acts with somebody else either on furniture or the floor or whatever. It’s just a frightening, frightening experience for them. They were just flabbergasted,” he said.

The list is going to be turned over to the sheriff’s department for investigation into these allegations. This has done nothing but tarnish an image that was already hurting. According to Minnesota Public Radio, “The incident certainly isn’t helping the Vikings reputation. Last year, three players were arrested for beating up a man outside a downtown Minneapolis nightclub. This year running back Onterrio Smith was suspended by the NFL for the season after he was caught with a device design to help beat drug tests. And several other players have been recently arrested for misdemeanor offenses.”

If you didn’t watch the Vikings game this Sunday and don’t know the outcome then maybe you would like to know they got beat very bad. Clearly something else was on their mind. I even heard on ESPN that someone higher in the Viking organization wanted each player to have their own legal representation by the time they arrived back in Minnesota from the game. Another instance where reputation is hurt, but reputation is clearly the last thing that is on the Viking’s mind.

So I definitely think this is a major public relations problem due to the whole Katrina issue.  Here is the deal.  I understand completely and feel sorry for all the victims of Katrina.  I have given my money and supported and helped in any way I can.  This weekend, however, is the biggest weekend of the year so far for Auburn football.  A lot of people got rooms in Baton Rouge before the hurricane hit and are now in big time trouble.

I had been talking to some of my fellow students in classes and they were telling me how their rooms had been given up to victims of the hurricane and they were notified this week about it.  Many people have anywhere from three to 10 people going with them on the trip. I have four other guys going with me.  And can anyone guess when I was notified.  TODAY!!!  Yes that is right.  I now have exactly three days to find an alternative, which I feel is going to be impossible.  Now we are going to most likely have to make it a day trip and get back to Auburn at like 5 in the morning.  

Talk about bad customer relations.  There needs to be something done about this I think.  I believe that everyone should have been informed about it earlier than this week.  The whole Auburn football team has to fly out of Montgomery on Saturday morning because of this.   I don’t want to sound greedy.  To be honest, there is no other person I would rather give up my room to then the victims of Hurricane Katrina, but that is not the point here.  The point is, we should have been informed about it three days before the game.  The hotel’s excuse was that they had no way of contacting me because I used Expedia.  Well if that was the case, Expedia and the hotel should be partnered already, therefore, a message should be on the screen telling us to call someone or get in contact with the service.  They SHOULD NOT HAVE LET US FIND OUT FOR OURSELVES!  I can only imagine how mad I would have been if this would have happened to me in Baton Rouge on Friday night. There are times like this where you just want to pull your hair out.  Oh yea…War Eagle!