Featured Story Archives Page 2 of 3 - Tombras School of Advertising & Public Relations

ADPR Celebrates International Women’s Day

March 8, 2021 by

Beth Foster, Courtney Childers, Candace White at ceremony

March 8 was International Women’s Day (IWD). IWD celebrates women’s achievements, raises awareness against bias, and takes action for equity. The IWD 2021 theme was #ChooseToChallenge, which encourages us to question stereotypes and help forge an inclusive world. The UT ADPR office was pleased to recognize this deserved focal point for women that is crucial to the women’s rights movement. To engage in the celebration, ADPR shared the accomplishments of its amazing faculty and staff who rewrite the narrative every day. Throughout Women’s History month ADPR is sharing the stories of students, faculty, and alumni who have helped us achieve so much.

Robyn Blakeman

Associate Professor, Robyn Blakeman, began teaching advertising and graphic design in 1987. She was responsible for designing and developing the first Online Integrated Marketing Communications Graduate Certificate and Online Integrated Marketing Communications Graduate programs in the country. In 2002 and 2004 Professor Blakeman was nominated for inclusion in Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers. In 2003 she was included in Who’s Who in America, and in 2004 became a member of United Who’s Who. She has published two texts, The Bare Bones of Advertising Print Design, and Creative Strategy for Integrated Marketing Communications. Professor Blakeman currently teaches design at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville.

Courtney Childers

Associate Professor, Dr. Courtney Carpenter Childers, joined the School of Advertising & Public Relations faculty at the University of Tennessee in 2006. Dr. Childers has published articles in the Journal of Interactive Advertising, Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, Media Psychology, the Journal of Current Research and Issues in Advertising, and the Journal of Consumer Affairs. Dr. Childers is the Executive Director of the Adam Brown Social Media Command Center. The Adam Brown Social Media Command Center is one of the only university facilities in the world powered by Salesforce Marketing Cloud Social Studio software and technology. In addition, Dr. Childers served as Chair of UT Social Media Week (UTSMW) from 2011-2021.

Moonhee Cho

Associate Professor, Dr. Moonhee Cho, focuses her primary research on organization-public relationships and engagement, nonprofit public relations, social movements, and strategic use of social/digital media. Cho has published more than 30 articles in peer-reviewed academic journals and book chapters. She also has presented more than 55 pieces of original research at national and international academic conferences. She was was the recipient of CCI’s Outstanding Research Award in 2018. She is a former fundraiser and public relations practitioner at Partners for the Future Foundation, the charity arm of the American Chamber of Commerce in Korea. She also worked at United Way North Central Florida to develop a donor relations program.

Elizabeth Avery Foster

Beth Avery Foster is Director and Professor in the School of Advertising & Public Relations. She was Co-Director of the Risk, Health, and Crisis Communication Organized Research Unit at the University of Tennessee from 2009-2013. Foster has published more than 40 articles in peer-reviewed academic journals and presented 50 pieces of original research at national and international academic conferences. Her research unit received $156,000 in funding from the University of Tennessee Office of Research. She recently received a grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to develop interventions for the opioid epidemic in rural Appalachia. Foster’s research won the College-wide research award for top faculty researcher in 2010 and 2017.

Mariea Hoy

Mariea Grubbs Hoy is a Professor of advertising in the School of Advertising and Public Relations, University of Tennessee. She holds her PhD in Business Administration/Marketing from Oklahoma State University. Her research interests include online privacy, children’s advertising, and advertising disclosures. She has presented at FTC workshops including “Putting Disclosures to the Test” held in September 2016. She teaches Advertising Campaigns, Advertising Issues and Advertising Research at the undergraduate level and Advertising and Society at the graduate level. She has been featured several times in national news for her work on Sharenting. Professor was the inaugural recipient of the DeForrest Jackson Professorship (2017-2020) in the School of Advertising and Public Relations.

Sally McMillan

Professor Sally J. McMillan’s primary teaching areas are advertising management, media, social media, and research. McMillan served as associate dean for academic programs in the College of Communication and Information (2005-2009), as UT Knoxville Vice Provost for Academic Affairs (2010-2015) and as ADPR Interim Director (2019-20). Her research explores the impact of new communication technologies on individuals, organizations and society; examines factors that lead to academic success for students from diverse backgrounds; and evaluates approaches to communicating with underserved populations about health. She has published more than 50 scholarly articles and has received multiple awards for both her teaching and research. She is a member of the American Academy of Advertising, the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, the Association of Internet Researchers and the International Communication Association.

Candace White

Professor Candace L. White’s research interests include the role of global corporations as non-state actors in public diplomacy, and how corporate social responsibility and CSR communication affect the image and national reputation of the country with which the corporation is associated. She is a Faculty Fellow at the Howard H. Baker, Jr. Center for Public Policy in the area of global security and an Arthur W. Page Legacy Scholar. She serves on the editorial boards of the Journal of Public Relations Research and the International Journal of Strategic Communication. She was a Fulbright Senior Specialist at the University of Salzburg, Austria (2010) and at the University of Siena, Italy (2020); with support from the University of Tennessee, she has lectured in Denmark, Scotland, Wales, Austria, Croatia, and Italy. White is the current holder of the DeForrest Jackson Professorship in the School of Advertising and Public Relations. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Georgia.

Lauren Ziegler

Lauren Ziegler is the Coordinator for the School of Advertising and Public Relations and a Ph.D. Student in the Department of Anthropology (UTK). As a public anthropologist, she has worked in higher education for nearly a decade, focusing on student outreach to diverse and underrepresented students. She works with students, young alumni, and faculty developing outreach programs, creating web and social content, and providing support to the department. Lauren sits on a number of committees at the university including Social Media Week; CCI Diversity and Inclusion committee; and the Disasters, Displacement, and Human Rights biannual conference committee.

Natalie Hill

Natalie Hill is the Communications and Social Media Intern for the School of Advertising & Public Relations. Natalie is a senior public relations major in the School of Advertising & Public Relations. Natalie has worked for several organizations across Tennessee providing them with updated social media management. She worked on a winning campaign for a local nonprofit, Helping Mamas, Knoxville, and is currently working on a social media campaign for VANS in her PBRL 461 course with Dr. Matthew Pittman.

Jill Williams

ADPR student assistant Jill Williams is originally from Nashville, Tennessee. Jill attended UT for her undergraduate education where she received her bachelor’s in Communications with a concentration in public relations. Before graduating in May of 2020, she began to explore her options and decided she wanted to reach new heights and become a master’s student in PR here at UT. Her research interests include computer-mediated communication and how it affects relationships and crisis communications. Jill is planning to write her thesis in the coming year and hopes to continue her education in the social science field by pursuing a PhD.

Advertising PhD Student Analyzes Super Bowl

February 8, 2021 by

Our very own Advertising PhD student, Alex Carter, has spent the past two years using the Adam Brown Social Media Command Center to understand how various social media platforms react to major events like last night’s Super Bowl.

Especially in an event like the Super Bowl, companies use engagement on Twitter to measure the success of an advertisement in order to gauge whether the millions spent were worth it.

Click HERE to read more into Alex’s findings of the Super Bowl LV advertisements and performers.

ADPR Graduate Student and Assistant Professor Published

December 15, 2020 by

Graduate student Shelby Luttman and ADPR Assistant Professor Dr. Sifan Xu have recently been published in New Media & Society for their research paper about how people developed online networks in protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline. The two worked on social media and coding to research this.

“I was learning how to do it [coding] as we went along. Dr. Xu was incredible the whole time and I learned so much,” Luttman said.

The research paper was presented at the International Communication Association Conference digitally.

“It was a long process but it’s been so exciting. When I visited Tennessee there was just a click of it feeling right here and all of the professors, especially Dr. Xu have been so kind and helpful in making graduate school such a great experience,” Luttman said.

Shelby graduated from Appalachian State University in 2019 and is now in the masters program at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Her focus is in public relations, but she is particularly interested in research regarding health risks. At UTK, she serves as a graduate assistant for Dr. Xu and Dr. Holland.

CCI Alumni Start VOLs Remote Internship Program for Students

October 9, 2020 by

As many students around the country had their summer internship plans put on hold because of COVID-19 and economic uncertainty, the University of Tennessee’s New York City Alumni Chapter quickly organized a virtual internship program for future communicators.

The VOLs Remote Internship pilot program paired five interns from CCI with social media and digital communication roles at nonprofit organizations dedicated to education.

CCI Board of Visitors member Jamie Lonie (PR ’10), who also serves as president of New York City Alumni Chapter, said the idea for a digital internship program was born from the November 2019 CCI Board of Visitors meeting and became even more meaningful as entire industries started relying heavily on remote work in March.

The new summer program was open to rising seniors and recent graduates with particular emphasis on recruiting first-generation college students and students from low-income communities.

“Depending on each student’s background, some may be more likely to have the means or networks to secure an internship in a big city like New York, Chicago, or D.C. whereas others might not have the same connections or resources in those places,” Lonie said. “Moreover, even when students secure internships in another city, there are cost implications to spending a few months there. Many students may also have commitments in the summer to their family or other jobs locally.”

“As most communications professional shifted to online work, we saw remote social media work as a way to make internship opportunities more accessible and equitable for all students. They can still gain real-world work experience, even from home.”

The first class of interns included: Kyle Basila (Public Relations), Chazni Darden (Advertising), Tadezja Maxwell (Public Relations), Alana Peery (Advertising), and Josh Witt (Journalism and Electronic Media).

The internships lasted 8-10 weeks, during which participants learned how to create social media content in the voices of their organizations and gained experience using digital collaboration and social media management tools. Each student was provided a stipend, either through scholarship gifts from alumni and supporters or directly through the organizations.

Interns were each paired with young CCI alumni already working in communications and digital media. The mentors, all working in for-profit industries, provided concrete feedback on digital communications best practices along with career advice on navigating the industry. Alumni mentors included Jessica DiTommaso (2014), Beau Cobb, Schahrzad Mehdia (2016), Charlie Sells (2010), and Abigail Ritch (2013).

The program was also made possible with support from many other supportive CCI alumni and staff, including co-organizers Laura Gamo (2018) and Taylor Presley (2013) along with guidance from Dr. Sally McMillan.

Lonie said the goal is to continue to grow the summer program to include more students and more majors. “It looks like the future of communications work will continue to happen online and often remotely,” he said, “so we want to expand this internship program next summer and give more students these opportunities.”

Meet the 2020 interns:

Kyle Basila

Social and Growth Intern, Understood

Hometown: Atlanta, Georgia

Major: Public Relations (Plans to graduate: Spring ’21)

Founded in 2014, Understood is a nonprofit that assists people with thinking and learning differences to thrive by providing them with helpful digital resources and communities. The organization has also helped thousands of people with all types of disabilities succeed in school and find employment at inclusive companies.

Basila: “I feel like I learned the most about social media writing, and I’m a stronger copy writer now. On Facebook and Twitter, you don’t have space to throw paragraphs out there. I gained a good understanding about how to get a point across and make it engaging.”

Chazni Darden

Social Media Intern, Teach for America Houston

Hometown: Nashville, Tennessee

Major: Advertising (Plans to graduate: Spring ’21)

Teach For America’s goal is to ensure that every child in the country has access to an excellent and equitable education. In an effort to expand opportunities for low-income students, Teach For America recruits people to commit at least two years teaching in a public school. Darden specifically worked for the Teach for America Houston region.

Darden: “I learned to use Sprout Social, a useful tool keep track of what you’re posting and look at the results to know what’s working. Some of my posts were more engaging than others, so I took that audience feedback to figure out how to make future content work best.”

Tadezja Maxwell

Social Media Intern, Comp-U-Dopt

Hometown: Lewisburg, Tennessee

Major: Public Relations (Plans to graduate: Fall ’20)

Comp-U-Dopt was founded in 2007 with the goal of ensuring every child has equal access to education and opportunities. The organization fills this need by providing home computers and digital training to students in low-income communities. In addition to opening job and educational prospects to students, Comp-U-Dopt also fulfills an environmental need by repurposing used hardware that would have likely ended up in landfills.

Maxwell: “Before the social media internship, I had never truly understood the analytical side of engagements and reach. I was able to use this performance data to create better posts. Also, I leader how understanding the language of an organization is most important. You can’t make great content if you don’t know the organization’s voice.”

Alana Peery

Social Media Intern, Teach for All

Hometown: Memphis, Tennessee

Major: Advertising (Plans to graduate: Spring ’21)

Teach for All is a global education program whose goal is to develop leadership in communities to improve education and expand opportunities for children. Fellows at network partners around the world commit to at least two years of teaching in schools in areas of need. After her Teach for All internship, Peery accepted a new internship with BigWheel, a Knoxville-based creative agency.

Peery: “I learned so much thanks to my manager Daniela, the communications team at Teach for All, and my mentor Beau Cobb. Most importantly, I learned how to use what the organization wants to say and create content for them. Starting out, it was difficult for me to find out how to use the proper tone in my social posts, but over time, I learned how to find the client’s voice and use it in my content.”

Josh Witt

Digital Marketing Intern, GBC-Education via Amplifi

Hometown: Knoxville, Tennessee

Major: Journalism and Electronic Media (’19)

The Global Business Coalition for Education builds connections and cooperation between businesses, government agencies, foundations, and civil society organizations with a goal to ensure that every child has a great start to life, a safe place to learn, and skills for the future of work. Witt had previously interned as a writer with the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which helped him translate complicated scientific material into writing that was easily understandable to the public.

Witt: “Getting to use a professional social media management product like Sprout Social was really helpful for me, especially learning to leverage the social listening features to monitor what our nonprofit audience was thinking and sharing.”

PR Student Takes Inaugural Lollapalooza Class

September 25, 2020 by

Senior public relations student Grant Mitchell had the opportunity to participate in Lollapalooza’s inaugural five-week class at DePaul University. During the class, he learned about networking in the music industry and the importance of learning from entry level positions.

“When it comes to any industry, perseverance is key, and this class helped reinforce that for me through all of the guest speakers,” Mitchell said.

Mitchell cites the ADPR community as being critical to him having gained the opportunity to participate in the course. “Everyone in ADPR has been so supportive of me and the professors have been an integral part of me finding opportunities like this one,” Mitchell said.

Senior ADPR Student Talks Summer Internships in a Pandemic

September 14, 2020 by

As a result of attending the annual ADPR New York City networking trip in January 2020, Patrick Boyd landed a once-in-a-lifetime internship working in account management for FCB Health, a healthcare advertising company with a thriving internship program.

Typically, FCB Health’s internship program brings opportunity for the interns to work in the heart of New York City, with workshops, networking opportunities and working on various advertising campaign projects. However, the rise of COVID-19 cases caused FCB Health to make the tough decision to move the internship to remote working.

“Obviously I was a little bummed out when coronavirus changed my plans of working in New York City for the summer,” Boyd said. “But as interns, we had all of the speakers we were supposed to, we were busy every day, we were able to get mentors, we had people to check-in with and so many resources available without even physically being in the office.”

From the end of June to mid-August, Boyd collaborated with interns from around the country in the account management department. He worked with various research technologies, wrote creative briefs and even was part of a pitch to the CEO.

“It felt like I was doing an internship every day which I enjoyed because that was the goal for this summer,” Boyd said. “ADPR prepared me unbelievably well for this internship. I felt like I knew what I was doing and just had a foundation to be able to learn more.”

Boyd started as a sports management major when he first came to UT. As soon as he changed his major to advertising, future job opportunities and real-world practice were the reality of his classes.

“I love it because the faculty just works right beside you and the people you meet in classes become your family,” Boyd said. “You can take yourself as far as you want to go.”

Marketing a Vol Hotel

August 17, 2020 by

Ben Weprin (’01) has developed a national brand on building and repurposing hotel properties in college towns to appeal to alumni returning to their alma maters. His latest project has brought him back to his own alma mater, and he has given fellow Vols a chance to be a part of the project.

Weprin opened Graduate Knoxville in the former Hilton Garden Inn on Cumberland Avenue on August 13. The revamp includes a lot of features that will make Vols cheer, including UT-themed illustrations by cartoonist Marshall Ramsey (’91) in the lobby. And thanks to a friendship between Weprin and Peyton Manning (’97), the hotel’s bar and restaurant, Saloon 16, will boast the largest collection of Manning family memorabilia anywhere.

Late last fall, Graduate Hotels reached out to Associate Professor Courtney Childers of the School of Advertising and Public Relations to see if her students could work on a real-world marketing campaign for the hotel. The project was perfect for her Advertising Management class.

“The syllabus indicated that we would have a legitimate client for the final project,” said Kara Wegner, a Nashville native who graduates in August with a degree in advertising and a minor in business. “Dr. Childers informed us in March who our client was, so we pretty much hit the ground running.”

Read the full story on The Torchbearer website.

CCI Presents at 2020 AEJMC Conference

August 14, 2020 by

Faculty and graduate students from the University of Tennessee College of Communication and Information (CCI) presented 10 peer-reviewed research papers at the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication’s (AEJMC) annual conference, which was held virtually Aug. 6-9.

In addition, six CCI faculty served as panelists, moderators, and discussants during the conference.

Faculty serving in AEJMC leadership roles include: Amber Roessner, associate professor in the School of Journalism and Electronic Media, who was elected to the Standing Committee on Research, and Joy Jenkins, JEM assistant professor, who is the incoming head of the Magazine Media Division. Moonhee Cho, associate professor in the School of Advertising and Public Relations, was selected as an AEJMC 2020-21 Institute for Diverse Leadership Fellow and will serve as a member of the AEJMC Research Committee.

Others serving AEJMC divisions, interest groups, and commissions include: JEM professor Maria Fontenot, PF&R committee chair for the Electronic News Division; Roessner, teaching standards co-chair for the History Division; Jenkins, research committee co-chair for the Commission on the Status of Women; doctoral student Charli Kerns, newsletter co-editor for the Commission on the Status of Women; and doctoral student Darina Sarelska, Presidential Diversity & Inclusion Career Development Graduate Student Fellow. CCI Dean Mike Wirth is a member of the Executive Committee of the Association of Schools of Journalism and Mass Communication Executive Committee (ASJMC).

Advertising and Political Communication Divisions

• “Time, Space and Convergence in Advertising and Public Relations: Contemporary Analysis of Job Market Trends” by PhD student Andrew Brown, ADPR Professor Sally McMillan, PhD student Alexander Carter, and PhD student Nicholas Sarafolean

• “Best Practices in Online Course Development and Instruction: Targeting Advertising Students in a Post COVID-19 World” by PhD student Betsy DeSimone and ADPR Associate Professor Courtney Carpenter Childers

History Division

• “Our Forgotten Mother: Daisy Bates and Her School Integration Campaign” by JEM Associate Professor Amber Roessner and Monique Freemon (PhD ’20)

Mass Communication and Society Division

• “News Media and Twitter Users’ Framing of the Russian Linked Facebook Ads Issue” by JEM Director & Professor Catherine Luther and PhD student Xu Zhang

Public Relations Division:

• “CEO Activism & Employee Relations: Factors Affecting Employees’ Sense of Belonging in Workplace” by ADPR Associate Professor Moonhee Cho, ADPR Assistant Professor Sifan Xu, and Brandon Boatwright (PhD ’20)

Public Relations and Communication Technology Divisions

• “Alexa, What Do You Know: An Investigation of Smart Speakers and Privacy Perceptions” by PhD student Nicholas Sarafolean and ADPR Associate Professor Courtney Carpenter Childers

• “The Target of Incivility: Examining the Uncivil Discourse on Social Media Platforms” by JEM Assistant Professor Mustafa Oz and Bahtiyar Nurumov (Suleyman Demiral University)

• “Effects of Narratives on Individuals’ Skepticism Toward Corporate Social Responsibility Efforts” by ADPR Assistant Professor Sifan Xu and PhD student Anna Kochigina

Sports Communication Interest Group

“Game Time or Not? Behavioral Predictors of Sports Brand Engagement on Social Media” by ADPR Assistant Professor Matthew Pittman and Brandon Boatwright (PhD ’20)

“Occupational and Job Sex Segregation in Sports Information: A 10-year Update” by PhD student Charli Kerns and JEM Associate Professor Erin Whiteside

Faculty and doctoral students who served as moderators, discussants, panelists and workshop leaders are: JEM Lecturer Maria Fontenot, JEM Professor Mark Harmon, JEM Assistant Professor Joy Jenkins, JEM Associate Professor Amber Roessner, JEM Associate Professor Erin Whiteside, and CCI Dean Mike Wirth.

ADPR Virtually Presents at American Academy of Advertising Conference

April 13, 2020 by

ADPR Graduate Students Alex Carter and Nicholas Sarafolean

School of Advertising and Public Relations has a strong presence at the recent American Academy of Advertising Conference, March 26-29, 2020.

Professor of Advertising, Eric Haley assumed his official role as President of the American Academy of Advertising, March 27. Prior, he served as the Vice President of the Academy from March 2018 to March 2019, and President-Elect from March 2019 – March 2020.

Interim Director and Professor Sally J. McMillan received the American Academy of Advertising Ivan L. Preston Outstanding Contribution to Research Award, March 28, 2020. The Ivan L. Preston Outstanding Contribution to Research Award honors individuals who have made sustained and systematic contributions to advertising research.

Assistant Professor Matthew Pittman and Professor Eric Haley presented their original research paper entitled, Cognitive Load and Social Media Advertising: Platform Use Induces Load Which Leads to Reliance on Cues.

Samantha Lavoi (MS UTK, Advertising, 2019), along with Professor Eric Haley, presented their original research paper entitled, How Pro-Social Agencies Define Themselves and Their Value: A Critical Constructivist Grounded Theory.

UT MS candidate Nicholas Sarafolean, and UT doctoral student, Alexander Carter presented their original research paper entitled, Applying Taylor’s Message Strategy Model to Smart Speakers. Their paper was a finalist for the AAA outstanding student conference paper award.

UT graduate students, Nicholas Sarafolean and Alexander Carter were awarded American Academy of Advertising graduate student travel grants. Samantha Lavoi was awarded the American Academy of Advertising’s Ronald Taylor University of Tennessee Student Travel Grant.