This morning, I recorded a quick screencast to show you how to access the five NewsU courses we’re completing as part of PR Writing this semester and how to send me your course reports.
AP Style Bootcamp :: Flagging Your 2009 AP Stylebook
Get out your 2009 AP Stylebook, Post-It notes and a pen and get ready for a short bootcamp by Barbara Nixon. Learn what the five most important things to know about AP Style are, and even get a bonus at the end. Flag your book as you go along, pausing the Prezi below when you need to.
Want a PDF of the 5 Things and their page numbers that I refer to in the video? Here you go:
What PR Writers REALLY Need to Know About AP Style, Revisited
[Updated from a blog post from April 2009]
In the public relations courses that I’ve taught over the years, it seems as though one of the biggest struggles for the students is writing using Associated Press style.
Why is learning AP style so important? PR practitioner Sandra Hernandez offers this:
PR writers really need to know the things that make them effective. I learned to write in AP in college, because it was necessary to pass the class. I continued to write in AP because I found that what I send to media had a better response rate when written in AP.
To help students learn more about AP style, I sought feedback from a variety of public relations practitioners and faculty members, trying to come up with a list of what PR writers REALLY need to know (cold, without even looking in the AP Stylebook) about AP style.
The most helpful advice came from colleagues on PR OpenMic, a social network for PR students, faculty and practitioners. (See the individual responses I received in the PR OpenMic PR Writing Discussion Forum.) Additional helpful advice came from colleagues on Twitter, including Kristie Aylett and Claire Celsi.
The most important (and sometimes confusing) parts of AP Style for PR writers are:
- dates (especially when to abbreviate)
- addresses (especially when to abbreviate)
- names (when to use titles, etc.)
- numerals (when to spell out, when to use digits)
- datelines (which cities need to be identified with their states)
Now you have choices about how to access the AP Stylebook. You can purchase a hardcopy of the book, buy an online subscription to it, or download the app from iTunes for use in your iPhone or iTouch.
Many PR writers can also benefit from brushing up on standard grammar. My favorite site for general grammar advice is Mignon Fogarty’s Grammar Girl. Consider subscribing to Grammar Girl’s podcast through iTunes.
Additionally, I found several websites that help my students with AP Style see my Delicious bookmarks on AP style and other posts here that I’ve categorized with AP Style Bootcamp.
So, PR pros and journalists, what would you add? What can help PR students understand what they REALLY need to know about AP style?
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Poynter’s NewsU Classes for #PRCA3330 & #COMM4333
For spring semester’s PR Writing courses that I’m teaching for Georgia Southern University and Southeastern University, I am augmenting my own content and our textbook with several courses offered by Poynter’s NewsU.
Here are the courses we’ll be using:
- Cleaning Your Copy – for Week 3
- The Lead Lab – for Week 7
- The Language of the Image – for Week 11
- Writing for the Ear – for Week 12
- Five Steps to MultiMedia Storytelling – for Week 14
Each of the courses concludes with a quiz. Please have the quiz score come to my university e-mail account.
[UPDATE: Complete the NewsU quiz for the course by Saturday midnight during the week it’s assigned.]
Questions?
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What PR Writers REALLY Need to Know About AP Style
In the public relations courses that I’ve taught over the years, it seems as though one of the biggest struggles for the students is writing using Associated Press style.
Why is learning AP style so important? PR practitioner Sandra Hernandez offers this:
PR writers really need to know the things that make them effective. I learned to write in AP in college, because it was necessary to pass the class. I continued to write in AP because I found that what I send to media had a better response rate when written in AP.
To help students learn more about AP style, I sought feedback from a variety of public relations practitioners and faculty members, trying to come up with a list of what PR writers REALLY need to know (cold, without even looking in the AP Stylebook) about AP style.
The most helpful advice came from colleagues on PR OpenMic, a social network for PR students, faculty and practitioners. (See the individual responses I received in the PR OpenMic PR Writing Discussion Forum.) Additional helpful advice came from colleagues on Twitter, including Kristie Aylett and Claire Celsi.
The most important (and sometimes confusing) parts of AP Style for PR writers are:
- dates (especially when to abbreviate)
- addresses (especially when to abbreviate)
- names (when to use titles, etc.)
- numerals (when to spell out, when to use digits)
- datelines (which cities need to be identified with their states)
Many PR writers can also benefit from brushing up on standard grammar. My favorite site for general grammar advice is Mignon Fogarty’s Grammar Girl. Consider subscribing to Grammar Girl’s podcast through iTunes.
Additionally, I found several websites that help my students with AP Style see my Delicious bookmarks on AP style, and I posted a Quick Guide to Associated Press Style.
A Baker’s Dozen :: The Anatomy of a News Release
Regardless what company you are working with or which newspaper outlets you are sending a news release to, there are a baker’s dozen items that should appear in most news releases.
View more presentations from Barbara Nixon.
Getting into the News
In Monday’s Introduction to Public Relations course, we will discuss getting into the news via news releases, media kits and more. Here are the slides I’ll use:
Getting into the News
View more presentations from Barbara Nixon.
There are some notes to go along with several of the slides. To see these notes, please download the presentation from SlideShare.
The Future of Journalism?
“Imagine, if you will, sitting down to your morning coffee, turning on your home computer to read the day’s newspaper,” says the KRON anchor.
Here’s a view on the future of journalism . . . as I might have seen on the evening news if I’d lived in San Francisco in 1981, the year I graduated from high school.
What do you find the most interesting about this news report? For me, it was watching them use the modems.
WSAV’s Obama Oops
My husband noticed this on the news at 6:31 this morning (July 8, 2008). I jumped out of bed, grabbed the camera and took a picture of the TV screen. WSAV had a video of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama, with the caption saying “Ardsley Park Shooting Suspect.” They ran this not once, but twice. I bet someone’s in trouble now. . .
It will be interesting to see if WSAV apologizes for this mistake.
UPDATE: During the 6:30 a.m. hour on July 9, I heard Kim Gusby apologize for the mis-captioned video clip.
Godspeed, Tim Russert
Though I didn’t always agree with Tim Russert, I will miss him on Meet the Press and the Today Show. Here’s a touching tribute to Russert by Tom Brokaw. Note the haunting strains of “Thunder Road” by The Boss.
