Research Paper Topic

By: Celeste Ligon

My partner, Sara Ligarde, and I chose American celebrity chef, Paula Deen, as the person we want to research for our paper. We will study how she reconstructed her image after news broke of her past use of the "N" word. We thought about researching Brittney Griner, but we had a difficult time finding enough information about her that would provide enough of a basis for the paper. 

Paula Deen will be an interesting person to research because her scandal occurred recently during the summer of 2013. Deen acknowledged using the "N" word in her deposition in a lawsuit. Lisa Jackson's lawsuit alleged that Deen and Bubba Heir engaged in violence, discrimination, and racism that ended Jackson's five-year employment at one of Deen's restaurants. Not only did she lose her spot on the Food Network, but she also lost millions of dollars from sponsors who pulled out. She was also harshly ridiculed by the general public for being racist. 

Deen responded shortly after the scandal through her teary-eyed interview and apology on the Today show. She claims to have used that word a long time ago and swears she is not racist and does not condone that behavior. She also tweeted thanks to all of her Twitter followers for all of their love, support and kind words. I'm looking forward to researching more on this topic and discovering what efforts Deen made to repair her image. 

Goals for Caritas PR Campaign

When we met with the Executive Director of Caritas, Buddy Edwards, he wanted us to specifically focus on raising local church awareness for Caritas for our public relations campaign. We want to try and help Caritas create long-term relationships with local congregations. Caritas wants church congregations, regardless of the denomination, to get involved as volunteers and/ or potential donors.

Our main goal with this project is to create tools that will help Caritas connect with Waco congregations. We are going to create a PSA explaining Caritas and all of its services for churches to show during their weekly services. This video will create awareness in the congregations and hopefully inspire members to get involved with the non-profit organization. We also want to create Caritas flyers and brochures that can be passed out during a church service. Lastly, we want to write an article for Caritas' newsletter explaining how churches can get involved with the organization. Another idea is to have a Caritas representative speak at the yearly pastor's luncheon so that pastors are inspired to get their members involved. 

One challenge with our task is that we want to make sure we are focused on one main objective. Caritas has some other weaknesses such as its ineffective use of Twitter and misleading slogan, however, our group needs to focus on the main problem of a disconnect with Caritas and local churches. We can help to a certain extent with the other problems, but our main goal is to establish good relations with Caritas and local churches.  

Caritas SWOT

For a group project for my PR programming class, my group is coming up with a PR campaign for the local Waco non-profit, Caritas. Caritas' mission, services, history and vision are highlighted in the image above. Through research, we discovered some of Caritas' strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

When we met with the Executive Director of Caritas, Buddy Edwards, he wanted us to specifically focus on the weakness of local churches not being aware of what Caritas has to offer. We want to try and help Caritas create long-term relationships with local congregations. Caritas wants church congregations, regardless of the denomination, to get involved as volunteers and potential donors.

Another weakness is Caritas' twitter account. The non-profits only tweets are the posts that are directly linked to the Facebook page so usually there are too many characters for a tweet. We could help Caritas by coming up with original tweets. The third weakness is Caritas' slogan, "because hunger hurts," does not encompass everything the organization provides such as clothing, household items, social services and travel. Our group could help come up with a new slogan for the organization that better describes its services.

Some of Caritas' strengths are the variety of services the organization provides, its admired reputation and networking in the community,  its positive customer service and good use of social media (especially Facebook). Some opportunities for the non-profit are the large number of Waco families in need of assistance, and the potential to built community trust and relationships with local church congregations. Lastly, some threats to the organization are a lack of fundraising, donations and  awareness. A final threat is competition with other local charities.

Celeste Ligon's Shameless Plug

I didn't know where to begin when I started to make my shameless plug. A lot has happened over the past 22 years. I asked my mom to email me childhood pictures. Those pictures provided a basis for the early years of my life, but I wanted the focus of my shameless plug to be my time spent at Baylor. I am graduating this upcoming May, and my goal with this project is for my shameless plug to be something future employers can look at when considering me for a full-time position.

My shameless plug details my internship experience and skills I've learned throughout college, but it also tells the viewer about my personality, interests and goals in life. A resume can only tell someone so much, but my shameless plug helps the viewer grasp who I am as a person. It highlights my core christian beliefs, shows my love for travel, and how my family inspires me. I was able to include fun facts about my life like the mission trip to Spain I went on with the Baylor Religious Hour Choir. My shameless plug also explains how I'm getting married this summer and seeking a job in Dallas starting after my July wedding. It was fun piecing together important parts of my life and turning it into a video I'm really proud of.

I also was able to work on my video and Youtube skills. I used iMovie to make my shameless plug. I am not confident in my video-making skills so I'm happy this project gave me a chance to work on that part of my skill set. I hope this project will be a helpful tool as I'm looking to enter the workforce this summer.

To watch my shameless plug, click on the link below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6P-jGyDpVE