PRSSA Honored On the West Coast

Two students from Millersville’s chapter of the Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA) accepted the “Star Chapter Award” at this year’s national conference, entitled “Bridging the Gap,” which was held in San Francisco from October 12-16. The “Star Chapter Award” is a distinction that chapters of any size can be recognized with by meeting specific chapter and professional development goals.

Meredith Noll, Millersville PRSSA chapter president; Gina Masciantonio, Millersville PRSSA chapter vice president; and Dr. Thomas Boyle, communication and theatre department chair and Millersville PRSSA advisor, made the 3,000-mile journey to network with industry professionals, meet fellow PRSSA chapters from around the country, listen to speakers involved in the field and attend workshops.

“Almost every guest speaker at the conference expressed the importance of being a part of PRSSA, and how most employers now don’t even look at a public relations students’ resume it doesn’t have PRSSA on it,” stated Noll.

The chapter was among a couple dozen recipients of the “Star Chapter Award.” Millersville’s PRSSA qualified for the award by completing a Compass Mark community service event last spring, strengthening the chapter’s relationship with the Public Relations Society of America sponsor chapter in Central Pennsylvania, emphasizing the importance of ethics at chapter meetings and receiving positive publicity in campus or community publications. In order to qualify for the award, a chapter must meet eight of the 10 requirements. Additional requirements for this award can be found at PRSSA’s Star Chapter Award website.

“It is such an honor to have our chapter’s hard work this past year nationally recognized. We hope to accomplish even more by next year’s conference, and I hope our entire chapter joins us in attending regional and national conference in 2013 for this incredible experience,” said Masciantonio

Speakers at this conference included Timothy Jordan, senior developer advocate at Google; Matt Prince, social media manager at Disneyland Resort; Biz Stone, co-founder of Twitter; Tim Westergren, founder and chief strategy officer of Pandora; and Michael Steele, political analyst at MSNBC.

“This conference met and exceeded my expectations. From awesome guest speakers, to potential job opportunities, and just having the chance to connect with students from across the nation, made it a once in a lifetime experience,” explained Noll. She also commented that the most beneficial factor of the conference was the ability to relate to other PRSSA chapters and find out how they operate.

Next year’s conference will take place in Philadelphia, Pa., and hosted by Drexel University’s PRSSA chapter. “We had the opportunity to meet Drexel University’s PRSSA representatives and offered them help for next year’s event. Planning for this event will start to pick up this winter. This coming spring and summer will hopefully be busy for us, as we help Drexel make this event happen,” shared Noll.

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