Community Relations

For our PR Campaigns class, we get to present a case study and discuss it with our class. My partner and I picked the chapter on Community Relations because we are both interested in non-profits and corporate social responsibility. This chapter gave a lot of insight on how to relate and impact your community. It is important to research your community so that you are able to best serve it. It is also important to know your companies strengths and find ways to use your strengths in service. There are many different ways for companies to give back. Some examples are event sponsorship and pro-bono work.

The case that we looked at involved a very small all-women college in New York, Wells College. In 2004, Wells saw a decrease in enrollment and was struggling financially as well. After looking into different options, the decision that the Board of Trustees and the President came to was to move towards co-education. The decision to allow men into this historically all female college was a shock to many, but overall Wells had a lot of support.

This case was interesting to me because when I first read it, I wondered how this fit into community relations. I realized that the college functioned as a community with it's student, faculty, large network of alumni and financial supporters. Community relations does not necessarily mean a non-profit or CSR. There are many different types of community relations and different ways to give back to your community.