MEETINGS
No program in August.
-----
Working Diversity into the Workplace
Once-formal global boundaries are evaporating, making diversity a critical topic
for businesses and organizations in Fort Worth and around the world. The Aug.
13 PRSA meeting, sponsored by Gestures Marketing Communications and Tovar PR,
will feature an open forum with Tom Burke, APR, from IBM; Mitch Hill with Baylor Specialty Hospitals, Leah King with Chesapeake Energy, Ken Reeves with Bell Helicopter Textron and Dora Tovar, principal with Tovar PR, on how a diversity-based approach can positively
impact employee morale, corporate climate and productivity.
Note the location change, this meeting only, to La Puertita, Joe T. Garcia’s cozy converted church. Because nobody ever had a bad time at Joe T.’s.
Looking ahead, Weber Shandwick’s Dr. Leslie Gaines-Ross, author of “12 Steps to Safeguarding and Recovering Reputation,” will cover exactly what’s in that title at PRSA Fall Professional Development Day, Wednesday, Sept. 10.
More next month.
Time & date: 11:45 a.m.-1 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 13
Place: La Puertita, Joe T. Garcia’s converted-church banquet room due south of the main building at 2201 N.
Commerce St.
Cost: members $25, nonmembers $30, students $20
-----
No meeting this month. Carry on.
========================================================
STRAIGHT STUFF
The Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce has released its 2008 media directory with
detailed contact information for more than 150 media outlets — major dailies, special interest publications, ethnic media, broadcast media,
networks, wire services, blogs — primarily in Tarrant County, with additional listings from throughout the
Metroplex. The 68-page print version costs Fort Worth Chamber members $30 and
nonmembers $40 plus shipping and handling. The directory is also available as
an Excel file, on CD-ROM and as a PDF download. Call 817-336-2491, ext. 242, or
order online at
fortworthchamber.com, under “Publications for Purchase.” ...
More from PR blogger Lauren Vargas at 12comm@sbcglobal.net or 817-714-7516 on the Social Media Club, a new organization for boosting media literacy and “playing in this social media sandbox.” The Fort Worth branch meets the third Tuesday of each month, the Dallas crowd
the last Thursday. ...
Natalia Corres has been a technology manager for more than 30 years and worked with everything
from mainframes the size of a building to laptops connected via satellite. A
trailblazer for women in technology, she will discuss it all in “So You Want a Web Site — Now What?” at the Writers’ Guild of Texas third-Monday meeting at 7 p.m. Aug. 18 at the Richardson Public
Library, 900 Civic Center Drive. WGT early-birds: Sept. 15, Earl Staggs, Derringer Award-winning author of “Memory of a Murder”; Saturday, Sept. 27, Kat Smith, “Preparing for Your Moment of Fame,” a workshop on radio and television interviews; Oct. 20, Dan Case, “The Best Things You Can Do to Get Published and Paid”; Nov. 17, Rachel Caine on giving up your day job and becoming a novelist. More from organizer Carol Woods.
PRSA local update: The scorching weather hasn’t affected the chapter’s community service. Third quarter: Tarrant Area Food Bank Backpack for Kids, 6 p.m. Wednesday, Sept 24. Volunteers will stuff backpacks with food items, in
some cases the only food the children will see between Friday afternoon and Monday morning at school. Twenty-five
volunteers, give or take, make a team. RSVP by Aug. 29 to lkwedar@phprinc.com. Fourth quarter: Cowtown Brushup, Saturday, Oct. 4, painting a house owned by a low-income family, an elderly
person or a person with a disability in a central city neighborhood. Fourteen
volunteers make a team. RSVP by Aug. 29 to lkwedar@phprinc.com to join the team and/or become the fearless team leader.
PRSA local update II: Alexia Corral will lead a group of Fort Worth ISD communication specialists as they share
this month with the Education SIG the strategies they’ve learned through recent professional development activities. SIG chair Barbara Griffith reports that Corral has been voicing Spanish-language radio ads for a campaign
targeting Spanish-speaking parents. The meeting is at 11:30 a.m. Wednesday,
Aug. 20, at the Fort Worth ISD Professional Development Center, 3150 McCart
Ave. Lunch will be provided. RSVP to alexia.corral@fwisd.org.
PRSA local update III: It’s a NuPros happy hour Wednesday, Aug. 6, 5:30-7 p.m. at Chimy’s, 1053 Foch St., Fort Worth. The agenda, if such can be linked to a “happy” hour, will include what tips might be discussed with the Masters SIG when both
groups get together. RSVP to smbrandt@safehaventc.org by Aug. 5. ... You can’t keep a good independent practitioner down. The IP SIG will not meet in August,
but it’ll be back in September. Watch for it, from Nancy Farrar at nancyh829@aol.com. ... Join the GFW PRSA Facebook group and be the first to learn about chapter
happenings. Log in to your Facebook account and paste http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=23875680024 into your browser. View the group and join!
PRSA local update IV: Dan Keeney, APR, and Susan Schoolfield, APR, will represent GFW PRSA at the National Assembly, part of the PRSA
International Conference, Oct. 25-28 in Detroit. Go here for conference details. Meanwhile, have a LinkedIn account? Add the PRSA Health
Academy to your groups list. Facebook user? Make connections using MySpace?
PRSA Health Academy is there, too. Two Health Academy events at the conference
have been announced: a workshop, A Smackdown in Health Care Marketing, 9:45
a.m.-11 a.m. Tuesday, Oct. 28, and networking, the Rattlesnake Club, 6:15-9
p.m. the day before. For those who missed the 2008 PRSA Health Academy
conference on Boomers, Xers and Nexters, wrap-ups and speaker presentations are
here. Next year’s conference will be May 13-15 in Washington, D.C.
PRSA local update V: Don Bartholomew, head of the MWW Group’s Research and Measurement Practice, will discuss “From Eyeballs to Engagement: Challenges and Issues in Measuring the
Effectiveness of Blogs, Social Media and Other Forms of Digital Media” at Dallas PRSA’s monthly luncheon Thursday, Aug. 14. Details here.
SPJ national update: The New York Times spotlights the case of “disembedded” photographer Zoriah Miller in an exploration of the restrictions on images from Iraq, or as reporters Michael Kamber and Tim Arango put it, “what some journalists say is a growing effort by the American military to
control graphic images from the war.” In a slideshow on its web site, nytimes.com, the paper presents one of the disputed Miller photos, other images from other
photographers that were restricted, and pictures from previous wars that went
through. More here. ... The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled June 2 that a high school was
within its rights to punish a student for writing critical comments about
school administrators on the internet. The court said Lewis Mills High School
in Burlington, Conn., has a responsibility to teach students the boundaries of
socially appropriate behavior. More here.
