The Public Relations Student Society of America at WSU is preparing to attend its annual competition to promote and spread awareness of a specific brand. 

Anna Dingfield, senior public relations major, said the Bateman competition allows students to gain experience with promoting certain brands and educate the public outside of WSU on what the brand does. 

This year’s brand is Culturs Magazine, which is a lifestyle network magazine focused on people with multicultural identifications who are having trouble straddling multiple cultures, Dingfield said. 

Hallie Rehn, senior public relations and advertising major, said PRSSA launched their campaign Feb. 5 and has until March 5 to gain as much traction as possible.

Dingfield said the team has to submit a brief covering their research and traction they got from their promotion of the magazine, including how many people on the WSU campus know about the campaign and brand. 

They submit everything to the Bateman competition, which filters through over 75 teams to see who gave Culturs Magazine the most engagement, she said. The competition will have semifinals and finals, and the winning team will be able to travel to a city like New York after finals are over. 

Rehn said being involved with PRSSA and the Bateman competition is a good experience because of how hands-on it is, and a professor who has been in the field is helping the team throughout the entire process. 

“It’s a really good experience to know what it’s like to be in PR hands-onCO,” she said. “Getting to know what I’m actually going to be doing in the future has been pretty exciting for me.”

Dingfield said PRSSA has helped her realize how much research it takes to run a campaign because a lot of classes at WSU do not explain that as well. 

“I think it really taught me how to properly research a topic and made me think about how many things the public had caught, like the Kendall Jenner Pepsi thing,” she said. “Understanding the public and sending out surveys, that was definitely a curveball I didn’t expect, but it’s definitely going to help me in the future with a career.”

Dingfield said getting to know everyone on the team has been one of her favorite aspects of being involved with PRSSA because they are all pursuing the same major and have the same interests, and she enjoys experiencing the ins and outs of running a campaign with those people.

To promote their campaign, PRSSA will host an event with a speaker discussing cultures in early March, she said. 

Rehn said it is a red carpet event open to everyone at WSU with food and drinks, and will give people the opportunity to socialize and take pictures on the red carpet and backdrop; it will be like a finale for their campaign because it will be held the day before their campaign ends. 

The event will be at 6 p.m. March 4 in the Compton Union Building Junior Ballroom.