ASSIGNMENT 4:
THE ADVERTISING AND PUBLIC RELATIONS MAJOR AT THE
UNIVERSITY OF CENTRAL FLORIDA
Elsa Anschuetz
Professor Mary Gomrad
ENC 1102
April 4, 2015
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Introduction
The advertising and public relations major at the University of Central Florida is a
“limited access” major, meaning that there are certain criteria that need to be met before a
student becomes accepted into the major. In this paper, I will be discussing a solution which
would allow more students to become accepted into the major, which will, in turn, allow more
students to major in what they originally planned on majoring in. I will also analyze additional
documents which support the reasoning to implement this solution, and conversely, explore some
people who may be opposed to my solution. The advertising and public relations industry is
growing, so it is only logical that the advertising and public relations program needs to grow
with it.
Literature Review
The purpose of this literature review is to analyze the advertising and public relations
major (ad/PR) at the University of Central Florida (UCF), and to see why students are interested
in becoming accepted into such a competitive major. There are many majors similar to ad/PR
that are not “limited access” that students can choose as their major, but yet hundreds of students
still wait for the day that they are able to apply to the program and hope that they become
accepted. Additional research is needed to get the university’s feedback on what they are going
to do to help allow more people to major in ad/PR, along with targeted questions directed to the
professors of this major.
The history of the advertising and public relations major at UCF goes back to the day that
the university opened up as the Florida Technical University in 1968. The Nicholson School of
Communication (NSC) did not exist and all communication majors were placed in the College of
Humanities and Social Sciences at the time. The ad/PR major, along with all other majors in the
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School of Communication, became a limited access major in 1989 due to a lack of professors to
teach the classes. Even after the NSC opened in 1997 and more professors were hired, all
communication majors have remained limited access (Nicholson Past & Present).
To be able to apply to the ad/PR major at UCF, a student needs to have 45 credit hours
completed, a “B” or higher in English Composition I and English Composition II, and have
received a “C” or higher in “Public Relations” and “Principles of Advertising.” Once those
requirements have been met, a student can apply for the fall, spring, or summer term. To be
accepted into the limited access major, admission is based on the student’s cumulative GPA and
a proctored essay. Out of the 3,000 students waiting to be accepted into the program, only 40
students each semester get accepted into the major. If one does not get accepted, they have the
option to pick another major or apply again in a subsequent term (Advertising-Public Relations).
The many requirements to be accepted into this limited access major is what makes it one of the
most competitive majors in the entire university.
The people who apply to the ad/PR program generally have something specific that
influenced them to choose to major in the program. These influences help explain why they are
willing to apply to a major that is extremely hard to be accepted into. I performed some field
research which brought me closer to finding out why they choose the ad/PR major. I conducted a
survey and interviewed several students which can be reviewed in Appendix 1: Survey and
Appendix 2: Interview to see the questions that were asked.
In the survey, the main objective was to see if there was anything specific that influenced
the student to major in the program. After I gathered the data, it was clear that in each case,
something in that student’s life had caused her/him to choose this major over taking the safe
route and majoring in something outside of the NSC (Survey). The interview that I conducted
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also provided similar information. The answers that I received from the people that I interviewed
told me that they first became interested in the program through television shows, but now they
are sticking with the program because they see ad/PR alumni and they are impressed with the
work that they do (Givon, Garcia-Maynard and Kraftchick).
An example of a person that influences current ad/PR students is UCF’s ad/PR alumnus
Lauren Berger. Ms. Berger has written two books, both of which are targeted to college students.
One book discusses how to get your foot in the door to land a job, and her other book provides
helpful tips as to how to turn your job into your dream career. For my research, I read her book
All Work, No Pay which explains the importance of an internship, and how to make the most out
of it. This book is extremely popular among students in the advertising and public relations
department, as an internship is what allows a person to be more-easily hired soon after college
(Berger). Maya Givon, one of the students that I interviewed, explained her passion for this book
as it is helping her find an internship for the next school year. Givon stated, “All Work, No Pay
gave me a push to be on the search for an internship. Grades are important, but experience is
golden (Givon, Garcia-Maynard and Kraftchick).”
Another inspiration to the students in the ad/PR program is the website PR Week. PR
Week provides the latest news and information in the public relations field. Another website that
also provides news about the public relations field is PR Daily. This publication also provides
people in the industry with the most updated news and success stories. Hearing about all of the
advancing ways to communicate effectively to the public, employees, and employers brings a
great deal of joy to all of the students in the major because each one of them that I have spoken
to hopes to one day do something so influential and great that they will also be featured in one of
the magazines.
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Successful advertising campaigns are what also keeps current ad/PR students interested
and dedicated to the field. Cole Haan’s “Don’t Go Home” advertising campaign is a great
example of a successful campaign. The problem that Cole Haan was having was that younger
generations viewed pumps as “mom” shoes causing them to never wear them. Changing the
audience’s perception of the brand and the shoes was the goal that Cole Haan was trying to
reach. The “Nobility” video that he posted shows the transformation that consumers had just by
the change of approach that Cole Haan took. This increased brand recognition and sales overall
(Cole Haan). This success story has inspired ad/PR students as they hope to someday participate
and create advertisements and campaigns that are extremely successful and inspiring.
The topic that I picked turned out to be a very niche subject with very little research
being conducted to date. Since there hasn’t been any significant research that has been done
regarding the advertising and public relations major at UCF, I decided to review work regarding
successful advertisements in general, since that is an inspiration for the students in the ad/PR
program. The scholarly article “Advertising Creativity Matters” explains that the more work that
the advertiser puts into the ad, the better the ad is received by the public. This is an important
influencer for people pursuing a degree in ad/PR because this means that they have to be
extremely committed to their major to actually become successful at it. This could potentially
play a large role in the reason that all communication majors are limited access, as each student
is getting the best education they can by learning in small classrooms with select well-educated
professors. It is the job of the professors to make sure that each student is learning how to be
creative and to bring a new twist to advertising. The way that this is done is through projects and
field work, such as creating an advertisement, or examining other people’s work (Dahlen,
Rosengren and Torn).
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Another article that I examined was Kris Wilton’s “When Instagram Success Leads to
Advertising Assignments. Wilton’s article discusses the opening of more positions in advertising
due to the recent explosion of the use of social media. Instagram and other social media sites
have increased web-based advertisements, producing a need for more people to work in
advertising. Due to the increase in social media, more students are becoming interested in
majoring in advertising to be able to learn the specifics about the field. Although majoring in
marketing could also lead to a person getting a job in advertising, most people who are initially
interested in advertising want to major in it so that they can learn all of the small details which
will set them apart from other people trying to get into the field. This helps support my research
question because the fact that advertising is a growing field increases the likelihood of landing a
job straight out of college. This is appealing to all students as many want a stable job after
finishing their education (Wilton).
An article which challenges my position is the scholarly article “Misleading Advertising
for Antidepressants in Sweden: A Failure of Pharmaceutical Industry Self-Regulation” by Anna
V. Zetterqvist and Shai Mulinari. This article explains a situation in which advertising was
misleading as it looks at antidepressant advertising in Sweden. This article examines the
strengths and weaknesses of pharmaceutical industry self-regulation through antidepressant
advertising in Sweden. Advertisements in the Swedish Medical Journal were examined through
case reports from self-regulatory bodies. The authors investigated the extent of violating
advertising, pattern of code breaches, rate at which the system reached to violating advertising,
prevalence of and oversight claims regarding antidepressant efficacy and disease causality, and
costs for manufactures associated with violating advertising. The main code breaches showed
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that they failed to protect doctors from unreliable information on antidepressants as 34 percent of
advertisements breached the industry code (Zetterqvist and Mulinari).
Through an exhaustive literature search, I found that there hasn’t been any research
directly related to the ad/PR program at UCF that has been conducted aside from the research
that I have performed. Further research can be done to see how professors feel about the ad/PR
program being limited access, such as if they feel like it hinders a lot of students from achieving
their goal of becoming an ad/PR major, or if the university is planning on expanding the number
of openings within the major. Other research that can be done would be to determine the
difference in success rates of limited access majors compared to ones that are open to all
students. This could include graduation rates, happiness rates, along with post-graduation income
levels. Since the ad/PR program is limited access, it could be that more people will get a job soon
after graduation and have a more successful career overall. Once this research has been
conducted, people will begin to form opinions as to whether or not they believe that limited
access majors are actually necessary, and it may become a topic of discussion in the future. The
advertising and public relations major at UCF is a very under-researched topic that deserves
more attention as it may help the overall success of students in the major.
Methodology and Results
For my field work, I conducted both a survey and several interviews to students waiting
to be accepted into the advertising and public relations major at UCF. The students that
participated in my survey and my interviews were all students between the ages of 18 and 20. Of
the 25 people that I gave the survey to, 20 of them, or 80% of the random sample, were female,
while only five of them were male. This is not a surprising distribution, as most of the students
interested in the ad/PR program are female. Of the five students that I interviewed, all were
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female and happened to be 19 years old. The age and gender demographics of the people that I
interviewed represent the average student who would be applying to the program.
I conducted a survey to students who are still waiting to be accepted into the ad/PR
program at UCF. I randomly selected 25 students in the “Principles of Advertising” and “Public
Relations” classes that I am a part of. Once I gave them the questionnaire, I asked them to list if
they strongly disagreed, disagreed, agreed, strongly agreed, or if they were neutral to the
statement that I listed regarding the influences which may have impacted their decision to major
in advertising and public relations. Once I received the completed surveys, I tallied up the results
according to the different answers provided. Once I tallied the numbers, I created a bar graph to
clearly view the data collected, as I believe a graph is easier to understand than just raw
percentages. Please refer to Appendix 1: Survey to see the survey questions and the graphed
results.
The survey that I conducted allows me to be one of the first people to study the
advertising and public relations major at UCF, and understand some of the influences which
causes people to choose ad/PR as their major. This benefits my research because, since there
isn’t much related literature for me to use, this is where a lot of my information comes from.
Between my survey and my interviews, I have been able to identify some of the main influencers
as to why people choose the limited access advertising and public relations major at UCF over
other majors which are open to all students.
To further my research to understand why people continue to pursue a limited access
major, I interviewed five people who were waiting to be accepted into the advertising and public
relations major at UCF. The students that I selected were students in my two introductory
classes. I asked them questions which were all related to their interest in the major, and the
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variety of answers that I received were all very similar to each other.
The interviews taught me that each person applying to the program are very similar. Each
person seems to be motivated by external factors, such as characters on television shows or
successful ad/PR alumni, but all of them also stated that their main motivation came from within.
None of the students want to back down from the original goal that they had set for themselves,
and each of them are still determined to finish what they started and moreover, be successful at
it. For my final project, I interviewed more students to confirm that my findings were correct.
Please refer to Appendix 2: Interview for the questions that I asked in my interviews.
Proposed Solution
To reduce the issue of this major being an extremely competitive limited access major, I
plan on providing a formal report to John Hitt, the president of the University of Central Florida.
I do not believe that it is necessary to completely solve this issue, as the advertising and public
relations industry is extremely competitive itself. Due to the competitive nature of the industry, I
definitely agree that there should be some competitive selection process as to who gets into the
major. However, what needs to change is the number of students who do get accepted. My end
goal would be for one hundred students to be accepted each semester instead of forty.
In the formal letter, I plan on addressing the facts which prove that the qualifications to
being accepted into the major are potentially unfair and can limit students’ ability to graduate in
a timely manner. For example, if a student is pursuing a degree in ad/PR, but does not get
accepted into the program, that student will then need to switch her major which may delay their
graduation. After the description of the problem is laid out, I will go into detail about how this
problem can be reduced. All communication majors are being moved to downtown Orlando in
2017, which is a great opportunity for updating the major, and hiring more teachers. If more
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professors are hired to teach courses in the advertising and public relations department, then
more students will be able to take the courses offered. This could allow more students to be
accepted into the program, and with gradual increases, it could ultimately result in the ability to
be able to accept 100 students each semester. With 100 students being accepted into the program
each semester, more students would have the opportunity to graduate on time and also graduate
in the major that was their first choice.
Once the proposed solution has been stated, I can then elaborate on how these changes
will benefit UCF as a whole, which would provide great appeal to President Hitt. These changes
to the major can bring about more students applying to the university, as more alumni will have
success stories with their careers. The advertising and public relations field is growing, so the
major needs to grow with it. If the major isn’t keeping up with the demands of the industry, then
the demand for students in the field will be far greater than the supply.
This change will also increase the “likability” of the university with current students.
Now, many students aren’t being accepted into the major of their choice which may give them a
negative view of the university. If more people get into their preferred major, the university will
receive higher ratings from current students. I believe that this formal report will bring about
great things for the advertising and public relations major as it will implement many features to
match the needs of a growing industry. An example of what I would write to President Hitt is
located in Appendix 3: Formal Report.
Opposing Views Summary
I believe that the main group of people who will oppose my solution are the people
monitoring the finances of the university. Since the solution that I presented requires more
teachers to be hired, that will, in turn, require the university to spend more money. The university
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has many competing demands for resources, so it will be quite difficult to prove and explain why
hiring more teachers for this specific program is especially important. I believe that without a
detailed and articulate explanation as to why it is so important to hire teachers for the ad/PR
major, the financial board will reject this proposal even if President Hitt believes that this
solution is valuable and easy to implement.
The financial board will most likely require a less costly solution in which more people
can be accepted into the program. Something that may be an acceptable solution would be to just
accept more students into the major without hiring additional teachers. This, however, would not
be as effective a solution because the ad/PR major requires a lot of individual communication
training which would be quite difficult with a class of 150 students. Although there are other
solutions which would be cheaper, money still needs to be invested into the program to have an
effective solution be implemented.
Justification of Position
The ad/PR major is a serious problem at UCF as many students are not able to graduate
within four years due to delayed acceptance into the program, or not being accepted at all. If a
student is not accepted the first time he/she applies, then the student has the option to keep
applying or to find another major which is easier to get into. This is also a serious problem
because as the ad/PR industry is growing, more people are in need to fill positions in those
industries. If the program keeps accepting only forty students each semester, UCF alumni will
not be well-dispersed in the industry. UCF is a growing school, and a great way for more people
to hear about UCF is for its alumni to be successful.
The formal letter that I am writing to President Hitt will help start the transition for more
students to be accepted into the program as it provides the president of UCF a timeline and an
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end goal. With these in mind, President Hitt may take my points into consideration, and will, at
the very least, be aware of the issue. Being the president of the second-largest university in the
United States of America is not easy as he has many things that he has to keep an eye on. With
letters of concern and proposed solutions such as mine, the president can start to think of the next
steps that he has to take, and where it fits into the universities goals. Resolving issues associated
with the limited access major for the ad/PR program is not a quick and easy fix, so the president
and his staff needs plenty of time to be able to think of the most efficient way to work it into the
university’s plans for the future.
I believe that the solution I proposed of increasing the number of admitted students to
100 per semester and increasing the staff proportionately is the best, more realistic solution that
there could possibly be at this given time. My solution will go directly to President Hitt who is
the person who could do something about this issue immediately. Changes need to start being
implemented within the next couple of years, as the industry is already growing and the major
has not made any changes in years to meet the new demands. This shows that the major is
already behind the level at which it should be. Since the proposed timeline in the formal report
states that changes need to start in 2017, President Hitt would need to present this information at
one of his next board meetings, and try to get other board members to understand the issue. If I
mailed this letter out to President Hitt by the end of the semester, it would give him plenty of
time to be aware of the issue, and it would also allow more time for other students and professors
to show their eagerness for a change in the way that people are admitted to this major.
Conclusion
The advertising and public relations major at UCF stands as one of the most competitive
limited access majors at the university. As both the advertising and public relations industries are
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growing, it is important that the major makes changes to grow too. It is critical that President
John Hitt is made aware of the issue, as many students are being affected by the major’s current
prerequisites for acceptance. It is important for people to voice their concerns about this major to
the president of the university, professors, other students, and on social media websites. Other
students should voice their concerns through petitions and e-mails to spread the word to other
students, and make this problem well known throughout the university. The more people affected
by this issue of having an extremely competitive limited access major, the more people who can
speak up to make changes. The advertising and public relations major needs to see some
changes, otherwise many students won’t graduate on time or graduate with the major that they
originally wanted. College is about finding what it is that a student wants to do after their
education is over, and it is the college’s responsibility to help students to pursue their passion.
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LIST OF REFERENCES
Advertising-Public Relations. 2015. Web. 17 March 2015.
<http://communication.cos.ucf.edu/program/advertising-public-relations/>.
Berger, Lauren. All Work, No Pay: Finding an Internship, Building Your Resume, Making
Connections, and Gaining Job Experience. New York: Ten Speed Press, 2012. Print.
Cole Haan Presents Nobility #dontgohome. Cole Haan. 2012. YouTube. 17 March 2015.
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9tRUgaG1sY>.
Dahlen, Micael, Sara Rosengren and Fredrik Torn. "Advertising Creativity Matters." Journal of
Advertising Research 1 September 2008: 392-403. Article.
Givon, Maya, et al. Personal Interview Elsa Anschuetz. 15 March 2015. Interview.
Nicholson Past & Present. 2015. Web. 17 March 2015.
<http://communication.cos.ucf.edu/about-us/nicholson-history/>.
Survey Elsa Anschuetz. 17 March 2015. Survey.
Wilton, Kris. "When Instagram Success Leads to Advertising Assignments." Photo District
News. Business Insights: Essentials, October 2014. 36+. Web. 29 March 2015.
Zetterqvist, Anna V. and Shai Mulinari. "Misleading Advertising for Antidepressants in Sweden:
A Failure of Pharmaceutical Industry Self-Regulation." Plos ONE. Academic Search
Premier, 2013. 1-12. Web. 29 March 2015.
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APPENDIX 1: SURVEY
1. Something or someone influenced your decision to major in the program.
2. Television shows influenced your decision to major in the program.
3. Ad/PR alumni influenced your decision to major in the program.
4. The ad/PR pending students are well-informed on all of the program requirements.
5. What you expected the program to be like is the same as you are now experiencing.
Survey Results
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
1
2
Strongly Disagree
3
Disagree
Neutral
4
Agree
Strongly Agree
5
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APPENDIX 2: INTERVIEW
1. What is it about the advertising and public relations major that causes you to want to be
accepted into the major?
2. What inspired you to pick this major?
3. Why are you so dedicated to this major?
4. How does pop culture (television, movies) affect your decision of majoring in advertising
and public relations?
5. Do the UCF advertising and public relations alumni affect your decision of majoring in
advertising and public relations?
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APPENDIX 3: FORMAL REPORT
Elsa Anschuetz
448 West Palm Valley Drive
Oviedo, FL 32765
321.960.4062
elsaanschuetz@knights.ucf.edu
April 4, 2015
John Hitt
President
University of Central Florida
4000 Central Florida Boulevard
Orlando, FL 32816
Dear President Hitt,
I am here to address my concerns with the advertising and public relations major at the
University of Central Florida, as it is considered a limited-access major. If you review the
requirements to apply to the program, a student needs to have already acquired 45 credit hours,
and taken two of the introductory courses for the major. With that being said, to be accepted into
the program, a student needs to have a competitive GPA and great, on-the-spot writing skills, as
each student is then asked to write in a proctored setting on a given prompt. The main issue is
that only 40 students, after all of the hard work each student has put into the program, get
accepted into the major each semester. The fact that it is so limited can have a significant impact
on delaying a student’s graduation date. UCF has been making more of an effort to get students
to graduate on time, and this could be a main component to delay that effort.
I believe that the easiest way to help reduce the problem of students not being accepted
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into the major of their choice is to take action in 2017. Since the university is moving all
communication majors to downtown Orlando in 2017, an easy transition into this plan-of-action
would be to hire more professors for the major. The more professors that can teach the classes
for the advertising and public relations major, the more students that can be accepted into the
program. I do not believe it is necessary to make the major open to all students, as the advertising
and public relations industry is competitive as well, but I believe that a good goal would be for
100 students to be accepted into the major each semester as opposed to 40. The advertising and
public relations fields are growing rapidly due to the explosive growth of social media, and I
believe that it is necessary for the university to keep up with those demands. Once 100 students
are accepted into the major each semester, more students will be able to graduate on time with
the major of their choosing.
Once these changes to the major have been implemented, the university will benefit as a
whole. With more UCF alumni making an impact in the advertising and public relations fields,
aspiring advertising and public relations students will look to UCF as a great option for their
college career. The changes to the major will increase the university’s appeal to current students
as well. Many students aren’t being accepted into the program now, causing students to change
their major to something that they may not be as passionate about. If more people become
accepted into the major of their choosing, these same students will provide the university with
higher ratings.
Please review the changes that I have proposed, as I believe that it will improve the
advertising and public relations major, and it will help match the growing needs of the ad/PR
industry.
Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter.
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Sincerely,
Elsa Anschuetz
Student at the University of Central Florida
Certified mail, return receipt requested