Public Relations quiz open

The Chapter 10 quiz on Public Relations is now open.

Look for posts on great moments in Public Relations, and great failures. We'll likely consider what's happening at Penn State, where, in addition to the great human tragedy that is unfolding, we are also witnessing a significant and important institution grappling with how to communicate to its various publics. This is of course a very serious topic due to the nature of the crimes for which Jerry Sandusky and others at Penn State have been accused. For our purposes in our Mass Media class I want to focus on how the institution has responded to this tragedy from a communications — or in this case public relations — point of view.

There have been a couple of situations in recent days in the GOP presidential race which have also required creative communication in order to control potential PR disasters. Herman Cain is facing charges of workplace sexual harassment when he was the head of the National Restaurateurs Association, and Rick Perry is trying to overcome gaffs in recent debates. So far Cain's approach has been to deny the charges and blame the media, and his accusers. His numbers have begun to drop after he took a lead over Mitt Romney in recent weeks. Perry has kind of taken the "Aw shucks, I guess I screwed up" approach. His numbers have been dropping like a rock for weeks.

So who's winning in all this? Don't look now but Newt Gingrich appears to be the beneficiary of his rivals foibles.