Baum Moderates PRSA’s State of the State of PR

This article was written by CCLP intern Faith Jessie, a USC Annenberg senior majoring in Public Relations. The Los Angeles Chapter of the PRSA kicked off 2014 with their annual "State of the State of PR" event last week. CCLP managing director Geoffrey Baum (pictured left) was selected to moderate the panel, which aimed to explore the new challenges and opportunities facing PR pros in 2014. The event, hosted at the Luxe City Center Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles, attracted PR professionals from all over Los Angeles as well as PRSSA student members. Guests were treated to an evening of……

State of the Union Watch Party and Discussion

Over 100 students attended the State of the Union watch party hosted by the USC Annenberg Center on Communication Leadership and Policy (CCLP) and the USC Unruh Institute of Politics. See more State of the Union photos on Flickr. KTLA and Telemundo covered the event alongside student representatives from Daily Trojan, Neon Tommy, and Annenberg Television News. Press Coverage: KTLA video interview: Local College Students React to State of the Union Address — Chris Wolfe Reports Annenberg TV News: Students React to State of the Union Daily Trojan: Annenberg hosts panel for State of the Union USC News: State of……

Geneva Overholser Named CCLP Senior Fellow

Geneva Overholser, former professor and director of USC Annenberg's School of Journalism, has been appointed a Senior Fellow of the Center on Communication Leadership & Policy (CCLP). Overholser joins a distinguished group of CCLP senior fellows that include journalists and media executives such as Cinny Kennard, Adam Clayton Powell III and Narda Zacchino, authors and policymakers such as Dan Glickman, Richard Reeves and Morley Winograd and pioneering leadership scholar Warren Bennis, among others…….

CCLP Researcher Highlights the Importance of Educational Exchange

Meet Lauren Allison: a Fulbright Scholar, International Peace Scholar and graduate researcher assisting Director of Research Mark Latonero at Annenberg's CCLP. It has been 6 years since my Washington Ireland Program (WIP) journey began. I was standing on a hockey pitch in freezing Scotland, clambering into my not-so-flattering goalkeeper gear, when Kate Hardie-Buckley (WIP '07) came running up to me and declared that I had 'W.I.P.' written across my forehead. I had just arrived at St. Andrews to study for an undergraduate M.A. in International Relations and was trying out for the school team. Kate soon took me under……

J-School Makeovers

Inside Higher Ed: Faculty Fellow Michael Parks is mentioned in this article which explains the changes to USC's Communications Masters Program…….

Technology shifts soft power goals from ‘winning hearts and minds’ to forming relationships

WASHINGTON – Successful deployment of soft power in the 21st century requires rethinking not only methods but also goals. That was the message this week from Nicholas Cull, who spoke at a CCLP forum here this week. Cull, who directs the Masters Program in Public Diplomacy at USC, urged policy makers to shift from "winning hearts and minds" to a new framing, enabled and driven by social media. "It is post-statecraft," said Cull. "It's not about 'hearts and minds.' It's about relationships."……

Australia debates whether cell phones reduce need for a fiber data network

SYDNEY – Critics here are sniping at the Australian government's plan to build optical fiber links to almost all homes here, at an estimated cost of $43 billion. The criticism is that the plan is going forward according to a plan devised years ago – a plan which assumes personal computers would be the way Australians connect to the Internet. At the time, that was correct. But now, with the unexpected surge of mobile devices as a primary medium and with the rise of smart phones as the way people reach the Internet, critics are saying the project could……

Millions of Africans use cell phones for health news and information

WASHINGTON – Millions of Africans now receive critical health information on their cell phones, according to speakers at a CCLP forum here yesterday, with the Voice of America alone reaching tens of millions of Africans a week. "VOA's African Health Network is a multimedia initiative in thirteen languages that reaches 50 million people a week," said Nancy Coviello, the AHN's Project Manager. "Literally no one else is doing this – not the BBC, Deutsche Welle, not anyone that we can find."……

USAID, CCLP call for students to address human trafficking online

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is tapping tech-savvy students to combat one of the most complex human rights issues of the 21st Century – human trafficking. On Wednesday, October 24, the agency launched ChallengeSlavery.org, its Counter Trafficking in Persons (C-TIP) Campus Challenge. The initiative calls on university students to develop creative technology solutions to prevent human trafficking, to enable victims to escape from traffickers, and to assist survivors in recovering from trauma so that they can lead productive lives…….