As most of us have learned in our public relations educations, and our subsequent careers, public relations is a strategic marketing discipline, and one of the four components of the promotional mix, along with advertising, promotions, and personal selling (i.e., sales force). Furthermore, marketing is a core business function. So why, pray tell, is public relations still primarily taught at the university level as a major within communications or journalism schools, and not as a business school major, a la marketing? This, my friends, remains one of the biggest disconnects between academia and Corporate America when it comes to our esteemed profession, and it is adversely impacting the prospects of recent graduates when they enter the workforce to embark on their respective PR careers.

Now, to be clear, I am not criticizing any of the fine undergraduate or graduate public relations programs which exist today, including the excellent curriculum taught at Auburn University. However, I am stating that that these programs often fall short in completely preparing their students for the real world because there is typically insufficient emphasis on additional marketing courses, as well as classes covering other core business functions, such as accounting, finance, organizational management, economics, business law, supply chain management and logistics, and strategy. This could be for any number of reasons, including poor curriculum design, lack of cohesion with the business school, or simply a failure to recognize the need.

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Janet Johnson has posted on a very interesting topic over at Marqui. It’s about the dangers that face naive kids (early and mid-teens) as they venture into the world of blogging and social networks. She’s has also asked Forward to shed some light on this subject.

Many parents have very real fears about the new forms of social media that are becoming a force in today’s world. Their children spend hours online; chatting on AIM, building profiles on MySpace and Facebook, and blogging. The biggest concern for parents is online predators who have access to a wealth of information that is being posted by kids. They post pictures of themselves, fill out an “about me” section, list their interests, favorite movies, TV shows, music and more.

So what kind of advice can we offer parents as people who know our way around blogs and social networks? What should these parents tell their kids about posting personal information? What experiences have we had, that will shed light on how to handle unwanted contact from strangers? How can we help parents have peace-of-mind about blogging and social networks, so their kids can learn how to utilize these new tools?

I’ll kick this off with a few things that I would tell my children:

• Do not post cell phone numbers, street address, screenames or anything else that could be used as method for contacting you.
• (This one is mostly for girls) DO NOT post pictures of yourself from the beach, the pool or any other place wearing a bikini or bathing suit!
• If someone contacts you that you don’t know in real life, do not respond, and come tell me.
• Do not post anything sexual on your profile. And don’t fill out any sexually suggestive surveys on MySpace.
• Be careful about posting personal thoughts or feelings in a blog post.
• I would look at my kids profile with them. I would look at their “friends list” and make sure I knew who they were talking to. I would also check their “comments wall” and messages to see what they were talking about. Again, I would do all of these things with my child.

That was a start, but I’m sure there are many more…

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A lot of college students go on trips for Spring Break.  Some of those will come back with tattoos.  Will that hurt them when it comes time to apply for a job?  I wrote a little bit about it at my own blog:

I raise the question, should an organization penalize (not hire) someone for something they did when they were 18 or 19 years old?… I think it depends on the situation.  …

…All I am saying is BE CAREFUL. The decisions we make today may have a great impact later in life.

(You can read all my thoughts here.)

I am curious what everyone else thinks about the issue.

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