Media and Social Media Best Practices for Feminist Activist Groups and Organizations

Feminist organizations and activist groups from the Women’s Suffrage movement to the Women’s March have utilized media relations tactics and techniques to share organizational messages. Over time, the art of media relations has evolved from a tactical role to a strategic necessity, one that is vital to the success of any activist organization or group as they seek to inform, educate and/or persuade their intended audience through the use of media and social media. This essay identifies best practices for feminist activist groups and organizations to help begin or improve their media relations efforts, ranging from initial hiring, to media relations planning and social media strategy

Influencing Public Opinion: Activist Public Relations and the Arrest of Susan B. Anthony

The Suffrage movement stands out as an early progressive cause that utilized an integrated approach to public relations in support of a clear objective. The arrest of Susan B. Anthony provided the movement with a huge opportunity to influence public opinion in order to win the right to vote

The Function of Second-Order Male Alliances in St. Johns River Dolphins (Tursiops truncatus)

Bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) have a sexually segregated fission-fusion society, in which males and females form different types of social groups for different purposes. Social interactions among dolphins are frequent, and group composition changes just as often. Male-male association patterns reveal the formation of alliances, which range in complexity. Recently, second-order alliance formation was confirmed in the St. Johns River, but the function of these alliances is unknown. To investigate their function, this research analyzes the seasonality of first and second-order alliance formation, and whether female presence plays a role. It was hypothesized that higher level male alliances form in order to improve mating opportunities in a society dominated by male-male competition. It follows then that more male alliances will form during the breeding season, including second-order alliances, and alliances of both levels will form more often in the presence of females. By analyzing boat-based photo-identification survey data, it was found that the average number of alliances was 1.5 per group in all seasons, if there was at least one alliance present. More alliances were sighted in groups with females, and this trend followed for the second-order alliances. The percent of sightings with first-order alliances was higher in the breeding season as expected. However, most of the second-order alliances were sighted in the non-breeding season, which correlates with increased aggression in the non-breeding season. This suggests that second-order alliances may be integral in establishing male dominance prior to the start of the breeding season

An Examination of Organizational Influences on Coach Decision Making

Sport coaching occurs in an ambiguous, complex, and dynamic environment bounded by rules, structures, and traditions unique to the context in which it occurs (ICCE et al., 2013; Jones & Wallace, 2005; Nash & Collins, 2006). Coaching is therefore not only pedagogical in nature but also features social and political elements (Abraham & Collins, 2011) focused on athlete development within a specific social and organizational context (ICCE et al., 2013). At the heart of this coaching practice is a constant process of decision-making (Abraham et al., 2006; Lyle & Vergeer, 2013; Vergeer & Lyle, 2009). However, research on the decision-making processes that focus on holistic athlete and program development (i.e. those that occur out of action), is absent from the literature. The Mosier and Fischer (2010) human factors decision framework, which highlights that influences on real-world decisions can come from one of five areas: the organization, available technology, the decision-making team, the task environment, and the individual, was adopted as the theoretical framework for the present study. The researcher targeted two primary research questions: what elements of the organizational environment influence the out-of-action decisions made by coaches? and, how were these organizational elements influential in the course of making a difficult, out-of-action decision? Fourteen interscholastic head coaches from schools in the southeastern United States participated in semi-structured interviews. Following thematic analysis, four themes emerged: school environment, the decision-making team, administrators, and parents of athletes. These results support the influence of organizational elements as suggested by Mosier and Fischer while also extending the conceptual understanding of the impact of organizational influences on coach decision-making

Communicating Diversity, Equity and Inclusion: A Public Relations Class/Client Partnership with a DEI Focus

In an effort to enhance the typical semester-long class/client campaign partnership, students in COMM472 PR Research & Planning (a campaigns style course) partnered with their campus library as a “client” to communicate about on-campus diversity, equity and inclusion efforts. Throughout the semester, students researched, planned, implemented and measured campaigns to help make the library a more inclusive environment for students of diverse backgrounds. Students were introduced to and applied a variety of research methods and public relations theories to guide their strategy. In addition, students developed a greater understanding of the necessity of DEI both on-campus and in the field of public relations