Crisis Management missing in Undergrad programs

Crisis Management Missing in Undergrad Programs
By Ashlie Clay

As a college student, I often find myself engulfed in my own bubble, preoccupied with classes, my work schedule and finding time for friends, all while striving for a sufficient amount of rest and consuming some fraction of the main food groups. But in lieu of recent events, hurricane Katrina and the tragedies that occurred at Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois University, I find it a necessary to be aware of what is going on outside of my own little world. In a utopian society the unexpected would not occur and the necessity of a crisis management plan would be null and void. But as we are all aware, the world in which we live is far from utopia.

Crisis management focuses on worst case scenarios and ultimately managing the information from internal sources to the media and general public. Good crisis management is proactive when it comes to this inevitable component of PR. So why not prepare potential PR practitioners for the inevitable? As a PR senior, graduating in less than three months, I have had no formal training in crisis management over the entire course of my studies at the University. Several universities do offer crisis management courses but are only required in graduate programs.

The crisis management link between PR, communication and business is vital in any industry and can truthfully make or break a company. We take such care in learning the art of news releases, the importance of research, identifying target publics and organizing and implementing a campaign, but what do we do when a hurricane destroys half a state and displaces thousands of people? Or our company’s number one product is found to be defective and harmful. Crisis management is part of real world PR and should be part of PR undergraduate curriculum as well.


http://www.prweekus.com/The-business-of-teaching-PR/article/45288/

http://www.gwu.edu/~guides/sciences/crisis.html

http://www.cmionline.org/

http://www.universitycrisisresponse.com/contents.htm

http://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com/