sponsorships of our monthly Speaker Series and Professional Development events. As I announced at the Christmas Party (it was great to see so many of you there), Cision and Marketwire are jointly sponsoring the Speaker Series. Their support will allow us to complement our roster of outstanding local speakers with out-of-town guests giving us a fresh look at our industry. Our first guest will be McMaster communications professor Terry Flynn, who will bring us insights into the pillars of strategic PR at the January 17 event. We have a few ideas in mind for other enhancements, and would welcome any thoughts you have.
Canada Newswire is expanding its support of CPRS Vancouver to sponsor our Professional Development series. Their support will allow us to reduce the ticket price of these monthly ‘how to’ workshops to $25, making the events more accessible for our members just getting their careers underway. The expertise imparted at these sessions plays an important role in development of individual expertise as well as standards of practice in our industry, so I could not be more pleased we’re able to introduce this price reduction starting with the first session in January – a roundtable workshop with four well-regarded Vancouver journalists representing newspapers, magazines, radio, and TV news.
It’s important to note Cision and Canada Newswire are adding to their long-standing support of CPRS Vancouver with these sponsorships, and have long supported our scholarship, membership intake and job board, respectively.
I would like to thank Cision’s Bill Steele and his colleagues, Marketwire’s Greig Soohen and Judy Hutchins and Canada Newswire’s Doug Lacombe and his team for their important support of our programming. I fully expect we’ll be able to demonstrate the value of their investment over the coming months, and will be welcoming all three organizations back as sponsors next year.
The other significant development we celebrated in late 2007 was the launch of a new awards program. James Hoggan, APR, of James Hoggan and Associates won the inaugural Vancouver PR Communications Leadership Award for his online DeSmogBlog. We partnered with the other B.C. chapters in this award to make this a truly provincial awards program – Northern Lights honoured the bait car program PR campaign, while Vancouver Island honoured Laura Stringer and Kathleen Foley for their A Place in the Islands publication. Congratulations to all the winners – they set a high standard for future awards.
Earlier in this note I briefly mentioned the vision our board set out after we were elected in the fall. Our vision for the year is a simple one – to enhance the core programming we bring members. For us, the central focus is building on what we’ve done in the past and continue to improve. Just as importantly, the vision means a renewed awards program, better communication with members, and continued excellence in accreditation.
The final focus we have is to plan the best national conference CPRS has ever seen – we’re hosting our colleagues from across Canada in 2009. Our team working on the conference should be sending you a note asking for input on the conference theme shortly – don’t be surprised if they follow up asking if you’d like to get involved.
The key to the success we’ve enjoyed so far this year is our people. Our veteran board members Michelle Clausius, Jeff Domansky, John Kageorge, Larry Cardy, Penny Noble, Paul Harris, Judith Walker and Tarina Palmer have been joined by some outstanding talent in Rashpal Rai, Kylie McMullan, Michael Bernard, Jessica Ruffen, and Renee Schisler. Of course, Donna Denham and her staff at Support Services Unlimited continue to play an invaluable role. We are looking for some volunteers to help out with a few portfolios – if you’re interested, please get in touch with me any time.
I would welcome an email or phone call from any member with feedback or ideas. Get in touch any time.
Regards,
Shawn Hall, President
CPRS Vancouver |
