Northern Michigan University offers many career-advancing organizations that students are able to join during their time at NMU. Public Relations Student Society of America is one of the many NMU organizations that offer resources and skill building tools for students majoring in public relations, business, marketing and graphic design.

PRSSA is a network of ambitious students looking to go above and beyond during their time at NMU. While still working towards their major, students will gain applicable experience and understanding of public relations and communications professions said PRSSA.

“You will learn basic skills like building a resume and writing a cover letter, but also about the business benefits of great, ethical communications efforts,” said the PRSSA website. “PRSSA also affords students leadership and networking opportunities, which are of huge value.”

PRSSA meets every Tuesday from 7-8 p.m. in Jamrich room 2315 discussing what workshops and events will suit students’ needs and desires based on each year. Workshops could be how to work on a resume, how to get headshots for a career, graphic design and anything that could be applied to the real world.

Outside of the workshops and events, PRSSA also holds campaigns every semester.

“So we put everything that we are learning in the classroom and out of the classroom, all together to pull off some pretty cool campaigns, sometimes for us, and sometimes they’re for people in the community,” said Brianna Sartin, chapter president of PRSSA and senior marketing major.

One of the most popular campaigns put on by PRSSA is the Coffee Crawl, which is a fundraiser for the Women’s Center in Marquette.

In April of 2021, the Coffee Crawl sold 300 tickets to accommodate the COVID-19 pandemic and making sure that everyone stayed safe. Of those 300 tickets, Sartin said that 282 were sold.

“Whatever we are doing, we always try to collaborate with people because it helps get our name out there and helps get their name out there,” said Sartin. “So every year we do something with multiple organizations across campus.”

Last year with classes and meetings primarily being held online, Sartin said that PRSSA continued to meet and was able to have opportunities that they never had before when being in person. Since returning in person, Sartin said that PRSSA numbers have been really up.

“Obviously, when we were online, we would host online meetings, but we were really fortunate to still be able to do like a hybrid format,” said Sartin. “And because of the pandemic, we kind of switched the way we thought about bringing speakers and things like that.”

During the pandemic, PRSSA was able to Zoom in the public relations director of the Detroit Pistons as well as the social media coordinator for Taco Bell.

“We just started dreaming bigger, since everyone is just zooming anyways, it is like the same,” said Sartin. “So it has actually helped us if I am being honest.”

Sartin said that PRSSA is welcome to anyone interested in joining no matter if you are majoring in public relations, communications or something else. For those interested, more information can be found on their website or by emailing PRSSA at [email protected].