SIU PRSSA Southern Illinois University Public Relations Student Society of America
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Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA) is a student ran organization and PR firm that largely caters towards public relations majors. PRSSA’s main purpose is providing students with real hands on experience with public relations. However, there are other RSOs and clubs on campus at Southern Illinois University Carbondale that can be beneficial for PR majors. Saluki AdLab is a student-run advertising agency, who works with local, regional, and national clients. These services include brand development, digital and print advertising, videos, social media, communications, and events.
Shawn Davis, the creative director at Saluki AdLab, talked about skills from both PRSSA and AdLab translating to the working world. Shawn was adamant that not just marketing and advertising majors should join AdLab, “ it’s a great opportunity for students to actually get involved and see what there career is going to look like, but more than that, I think it’s a really good service both AdLab and PRSSA.” They both work with lots of local cliental to help them advertise their business as well as update social media and compose press releases. Taking knowledge that is learned at the university and being able to apply it to real life scenarios and situations.
AdLab primarily tries to reach new customers but also tries to engage current customers as well. Currently Quatro’s is the largest client AdLab has “We use Facebook and Twitter, so when you see a social media post from Quatro’s it is coming from AdLab and especially right now during the corona virus it’s a way to keep people thinking about Quatro’s and keep them engaged with the brand” said Davis. AdLab and PRSSA work well together and Davis wishes that more PR majors would join AdLab to have a greater skillset variety.
AdLab does primarily focus on the advertising aspect doing public outreach however just as Davis says, “the two really go hand and hand…can’t have one without the other.” Having advertising and PR majors work together can be a great myriad of skill sets. But at SIUC students can gain real life experience in both and carry the skills post-graduation. After talking to Davis, it sounds like anyone could benefit from joining both organizations.
