November 28, 2017

By Sarah Vlazny, Page Center intern

Ellyn Fisher is the senior vice president of public relations and social media for the AdCouncil. A Penn State alumna, she joined the Page Center advisory board last fall.

Fisher brings experience and expertise in public service communications to the board having worked on groundbreaking campaigns such as Smokey Bear and “Love Has No Labels.” Her role at the AdCouncil is to promote the organization and its public… More

November 7, 2017

By Sarah Vlazny, Page Center intern

Gary Sheffer is a senior corporate strategist at Weber Shandwick, where he advises on “high-level” corporate, executive reputation and engagement, government and cultural issues. Sheffer joined the Page Center advisory board last fall.

Prior to his role at Weber Shandwick, Sheffer was the head of global communications and public affairs at GE. As GE’s VP of corporate communications and public affairs, he gained expertise in driving company culture and fostering positive… More

November 1, 2017

Below is the speech Jill Gabbe shared about Bill Nielsen, Page Center advisory board chair and former head of communications at Johnson & Johnson, at the Plank Center for Leadership in Public Relations' eighth annual “Milestones in Mentoring" event on Oct. 26, 2017 in Chicago.

Gabbe, a senior advisor at Finn Partners, recognized Nielsen's distinguished career as he was honored with the Plank Center's "Legacy Award." According to Plank's website, the award "recognizes those who have touched… More

October 10, 2017

By Marlene S. Neill, Baylor University and Amy Barnes, University of Arkansas-Little Rock

In our new book, “Public Relations Ethics: Senior PR Pros Tell Us How to Speak Up and Keep Your Job,” we point out that one of the biggest challenges young professionals face may very well be properly navigating the internal politics within an organization. Part of the difficulty is based on the reality that business executives do not like to talk about and/or often… More

October 2, 2017

By Barbara Miller Gaither, Elon University, and Janas Sinclair, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

While messages about the environment and climate change may be increasingly prominent, they involve complex scientific and public policy issues. In a study funded by the Page Center, we asked how members of the general public who lack environmental expertise make sense of these messages. We focused particularly on when the source is a corporate advertiser communicating about its own environmental initiatives.

September 22, 2017

By Virginia Harrison, Penn State PhD student

This summer, I set out to better explain how corporate social responsibility (CSR) relationships affect the success of their nonprofit partners, thanks to a Page Center grant. Focusing on large public universities in the United States, I interviewed 13 corporate relations officers at higher education institutions about their experiences working with corporate funders, and how these relationships impacted their universities. I expected to hear that these nonprofits relied on corporations for… More