Public Service Announcements for Community Partners


by Ann Abbott

In a previous post, I talked about building community-university partnerships that respond to community-identified needs. Clear and frequent communication, as everyone knows, is the key to building and maintaining mutually beneficial partnerships.

With one of my community partners, I took this type of communication to another level--I joined the Board of the East Central Illinois Refugee Mutual Assistance Center. At our monthly Board meetings I gain new insights into the Refugee Center's resources and needs. That allows me to think about how to match those resources and needs to my community service-learning (CSL) students' needs and resources.
At our last Board meeting, one of the Co-Directors said that they would like to do a Public Service Announcement for the local community-access television stations.

A perfect project for an enterprising CSL student who wants to gain skills in research, writing and project organization! And in the end, the student will have a video of professionally-produced public service announcement (PSA) to show to potential employers as proof of their work.

Here are the necessary steps for the student:
  1. Do an on-line search for public access television in Urban and Champaign to find out how to start the process for doing a PSA.

  2. In consultation with the Co-Directors of ECIRMAC, write a script for the PSA.

  3. Inform the ECIRMAC staff of times and duties for the actual PSA production. If the student has information to add, he/she can appear in the PSA as well.

  4. Do all the post-production follow-up that is necessary.

I'm hoping a student will tackle this in the fall. And if one community partner has expressed a need to do a PSA, perhaps our other partners would like one, too.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Vocabulary for Parent-Teacher Conferences

Image
I'm very happy that so many students responded to our community partner's need for help. Our students' language skills will help Central High School's Latino parents better communicate with the teachers during the parent-teacher conferences next week. Central's secretary will contact the students directly to schedule times with them. Here is some vocabulary help for students. Materias. School subjects are "materias" NOT "sujetos." You should remember subjects from your intro Spanish courses, but here are some reminders: historia, matemáticas, inglés, física, química, biología, educación física, etc. General vocabulary. Notas = grades; aprobar = to pass; suspender = to fail; conducta, comportamiento = behavior. Topics. Ms. Citraro offers the following advice: "The topics and vocabulary that would come up are about the subjects at school. For example: no ha entregado las tareas tiene que tomar el examen otra vez habla mucho en clase falta muc...
Read more

How to Correctly File Hispanic Names

Image
I know that community-based learning students don't like it when they are asked to file during their time in the community. However, their learning goals are to improve their Spanish and knowledge of Latino cultures. Filing information on clients with Hispanic names helps them with both. And imagine the impact of mis-filing for the organizations where our students work and and their clients. That's why I was unhappy to learn that many SPAN 232 students did not do well on their exam section asking them to put some Hispanic names in alphabetical order. I can imagine that some students feel that putting names into alphabetical order isn't important. It is! It is especially important in the organizations where they work because they are dealing with clients who may not have "accommodated" to the American system of using only one last name. And it is especially important for clients whose papers are so important for their legal status, medical information and oth...
Read more

Interview with Jessica Horn of ACCIÓN Chicago

Image
By Carolyn Kloecker , Span 232 student This past week I completed an assignment for my Business Communications class (SPCM 211) which was to interview someone in a field that I am interested in working for in the future. I asked her many questions about the organization, and lots of information can be found on their website www.accionchicago.org . This organization is a Community Partner with Spanish & Illinois, and has an extensive connection with the Spanish-speaking community in the Chicagoland area. Here are a few of the questions and answers from Jessica: Is ACCIÓN a fairly new organization? How did it begin? ACCIÓN Chicago started in 1994, but the parent organization, ACCIÓN was started in 1961. It is the largest micro-lending organization, and it began in Venezuela, and took root in the U.S. in 1991. How do loan officers communicate with clients? Mostly by phone, as people call in to the office to get a loan for their small business. The website is also a main form o...
Read more