Perfect. All right, you guys see the recording button on now? Yeah. OK, good. All right, so my clock is a little off on my computer, but I think it's passed 7:00pm now. But welcome, everyone. My name is Jane Antoniak and I'm the Chair of Accreditation for CPRS Hamilton, and last year achieved my APR. Congratulations on your APR. Thank you. And Alex Sevigny asked me to help with the APR Accreditation process for CPRS Hamilton, and I started doing that in June 2020 and that was when Alex became the Chief National Examiner for CPRS National. So we have a panel here tonight that I want to introduce you all to, and then we do have a small short presentation from CPRS National. And I'm going to run through that and hopefully will answer some of your questions. And then we're going to open it up to the panel, to your questions, and also some standard questions that most of us get asked. Claire Ryan [panelist] and I first attended this seminar in person at the 2018 CPRS National Conference in Charlottetown, PEI. Claire, of course, is joining us from the Atlantic provinces as well. So without further ado, I'm going to introduce our panel and so that we can get going, because I know probably a lot of you are still keeping your eye on the US election results tonight. Let's go from east to west. So from the east, joining us tonight is Claire Ryan. Claire is the Director of Public Relations at Cooke Inc., a vertically integrated family company based in Black's Harbor, New Brunswick. It's a salmon farming operation in Atlantic Canada, also in the United States, Chile and Scotland, as well as a sea bass and sebring farming operations in Spain. Claire joined Cooke from CAA Atlantic, where she was the manager of public affairs, and she managed communications initiatives, stakeholder relations and community partnerships. She began her career working with two of the region's largest and most prominent agencies. Claire is also an active volunteer and a community builder. She's a Past Chair of the St. John Region Chamber of Commerce and she is currently Chair of the St. Joseph's Hospital Advisory Board and most importantly, President of CPRS Society Atlantic Council. I'd also like to add that Claire and I have been colleagues now for five years. We met in 2015 as classmates in the cohort of the Master of Communications Management Program at McMaster University. So that's quite exciting. She has her APR. We went through the APR process together and studied for a year together and we both wrote this time last year and we both received our APR in December of 2019. She also holds a B.A. from St. Francis Xavier University and Advanced Diploma in PR from Nova Scotia Community College. And as I mentioned, she did as well achieve her Master's of Communication Management (MCM) from McMaster University. She lives in Uptown St. John, a community that she really loves and spends a lot of her time renovating an old house with her husband Phil and their three young children. So this woman is balancing a lot of balls. And if she can achieve an APR doing all that, so can you. Next, I'd like to introduce Dustin Manley. And Dustin is the Past President of CPRS Hamilton. And in 2018, he became one of the youngest people to earn the APR designation in Canada. He currently works at the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) as an Employee Development Specialist, and previously he was responsible for handling their social media and customer-facing communications. Outside of the TTC, Dustin teaches research methods at Royal Roads University in the Master of Arts in Professional Communication (MAPC) program, and social media management in Centennial College's Bachelor of Public Relations Management program. So welcome to Dustin and Claire. And the third person on our panel today: We're very lucky to have because he's so busy doing a variety of things, including a keen political watcher. Alex is an Associate Professor of Communications Management at McMaster University, where he previously was the director of the MCM program for 8 years, including when Claire and I were both students there. He is also Editor in Chief of the Journal of Professional Communication, and he is currently the Chief Examiner of Accreditation in the Public Relations Program for CPRS National. I've also had the honour of co-presenting with Alex at numerous national conferences on our joint research. He was my supervisor in my area of study, which is Digital Leadership Communications. So you're very lucky to have this great panel here tonight. Briefly introduce myself, I am, as I mentioned, the Accreditation Chair for CPRS Hamilton. I am in London, Ontario, and I am the manager of communications and media relations at King's University College, which is an affiliated College of Western University. And I have a keen interest in leadership communications. This past summer, I was a teaching assistant in the program and I also am an instructor at Fanshawe College in Strategic Public Relations. So there are no further questions, I'll just check the chat. Good to go here. So the APR: Do it for yourself! I'm really glad you could all make it here tonight. We're thrilled with the turnout and I think that this is actually a great time to dive into public professional development, despite the fact that there's a pandemic and you're probably all worked off your feet and many of you are stuck in your homes and or working in very challenging situations, there's never been a more important time to reach out for the support of organizations like CPRS and to actually reach out to your colleagues and to further your own skills in professional development. So tonight, we're going to talk about a lot of topics, including the top reasons to pursue your APR credential, which projects are suitable for your work sample, how much time you'll need for studying, what kind of support we offer as a community of CPRS--or perhaps the chapter that you may belong to if you don't belong to our chapter and what kind of supports we offer. So to get started tonight, I just wanted to ask what kind of questions are at the top of your mind? And if you want to throw those into the chat, that would be very helpful, I'm sure, to the panel to think about as we go through a quick presentation. First of all, eligibility: and let's talk about what APR even means, and really it is a voluntary program, highly respected and administered by CPRS National. It has been around for more than 50 years, and is the most recognized PR designation and credential in North America. And I know that for myself. it carried a lot of weight with my own organization after I achieved it. CPRS has 14 regional societies across Canada and holds a national conference every year, and I think that accreditation really improves your skills and knowledge. It's an opportunity to remind yourself of foundational knowledge that you may have forgotten when you were studying it, possibly in college or university, and it also is a chance to learn new knowledge and that both of those things were certainly my experience. It also prepares you for greater on-the-job experience. If you're not already in a leadership role, your year of studying and assessment will encourage you to take on one. So there are a lot of reasons why to study for the APR, and that's going to be one of the questions that I'm going to put to the panelists tonight,as to "what is your why"? Because I think in this time of reflection, for a lot of us during the COVID-19 lockdown and subsequently working from home, et cetera, we have had time to ponder what our own "why" is. And these are just some of the suggestions, that have come up over the years. For myself, I felt that I had spent two to three years in a master's program, and I didn't want it to end there. I did want to keep on learning and I also wanted to apply my learnings to achieve this professional designation. You will stand out and you will join a group of professionals who will be an amazing support system, and I can tell you that even with this seminar tonight, I reached out to the chapters across Canada and instantly received support. Everything from notes on this presentation, et cetera, to many of you joining because you heard from our colleagues across Canada, it is a very important group of professionals who really we hear it over and over again during the pandemic that we're all in this together. I do feel that I'm in it together with my colleagues on the panel tonight and also with our colleagues across Canada. And I think that's a really for us very inspiring reason why to obtain our APR and also to maintain our APR. These are some of the nuts and bolts about what's involved, and, you know, it's very fair to ask this now because it takes time and it takes money. And that's a lot of what people want to talk about right off the bat just to see what are they getting into. The application fee is due and the application at 1 minute to midnight (11:59pm) on December 1, 2020. And they [CPRS National] will quickly review that and then give you the yay or nay. What that involves is three references, two of which must be from APRs. And we're going to talk about that tonight as well, as if you don't know two APRs, how we can help you possibly gain those references. The next step, if you are accepted, you will be asked to submit your work sample overview and your CV or resume by December 30th, and I know that's a crunch time with the holidays, but I don't think we're going to be going to too many holiday parties this year. So it's possibly a great time to consider doing this, really. Once you've submitted your work sample overview and you will hear back likely around the end of January from CPRS National if your work sample overview and your resume meets the requirements, and in that case, you'll be invited to work on and then submit your full work sample by April 1, 2021. That's a big job. That's a big part of the work and that does count towards your overall passing of the APR-- the grading of your work sample and whether it passes and how you did on that is actually counted towards getting your APR. From that point, you will wait and hear from CPRS National typically in late spring--May, maybe June-- as to how you did on your work sample. And if you have passed it at that point, you will begin to really make your plan and start studying for the written exam and the oral exam, which will take place on those dates in October that you see on the screen. And those are universal dates across Canada. It's usually always a Friday for the written exam and then the oral exam can often be spread out over two days this year. This was all held virtually through a virtual proctoring system and all the oral exams were held online [in 2020]. In past years, people would have had to go to an examination center and write them and then have an in-person oral exam or in the case of myself and actually Claire, because we both were located in the cities where they didn't have a live panel, we actually did it virtually. So I think we were trailblazers there, Claire. And then once those examinations are complete, as happened just a few weeks ago for several of our members out of Hamilton, you will wait and hopefully pass. There are appeal processes along the way. For instance, if you don't pass your work sample, you are allowed to appeal that decision and possibly work through the appeal and possibly still continue on to. And there are also our procedures along the way where you can defer. You may have a health issue or personal issue, job change, or whatever that may have you to consider deferring--and you can retain some of these steps along the way that you may have achieved. Big question, you probably have already asked yourself, or you might not be here tonight, is, "are you ready"? And while you may want to think about if you're ready mentally and those might be some great questions for the panel tonight. "Are you ready"? According to CPRS National and the big one is the first bullet point, which you do have to have 5+ years of full-time PR experience in order to be ready. There is a previous level [exam] for any of you that may not have the 5+ years, which is the PRK, which has been recently introduced, which is the Public Relations Knowledge (PRK) exam that you can take. It's not an accreditation per say, but it is a [useful benchmark examination]. So there is also an online self-assessment questionnaire on the CPRS website that you can also take. So you will apply and include the three references, and that's the big step that you have to consider right now before 11:59pm on December the 1st. And it would require these. You also need to be a member of CPRS, and we would certainly welcome any of you to join our chapter--and at least to apply to join our chapter. And we do have you would apply through the [CPRS] National website and then indicate which chapter it is that you want to join. Further on then, for December 30th, there's your work sample overview, and I know that that will be important for our panel to talk about. They'll give you some examples of what they did. And you can now also use an educational work sample, which is what I did and also what Claire did. We did was did boil down our capstone projects for our master's degrees and use that as our work sample. And then finally, the full work sample is due in April, and I really want to draw attention to the word limits--the bullets are on the bottom of the screen. This is very, very, very important and probably will be your biggest challenge, actually. Take your capstone project from a master's degree and create a 500 word executive summary was actually a super helpful exercise for me. And then to boil it down to 2,500 words for my work sample submission, that is really what we spent a lot of time on, working with people within the chapter who were helping me with that editing process. And you probably know your own work, and especially any of you that work in leadership circles. The CEO does not want your full master's paper. Nobody really wants it, except your parents maybe. But you need to be able to distill your work. And if you get five minutes in the C-Suite to actually present your comms plan, you know, it's going to be a high level presentation of your work. And that is indeed what CPRS wants you to be able to do throughout the whole process. When it's time to write the exam, it's very succinctly laid out into sections and this is what they are testing you on, your skills and knowledge and your knowledge translation in a timed test that is 3.5 hours long. And we practiced a lot, literally the your stopwatch is your best friend. And there's a lot of practice exams available that you can work on, and eventually get down to. Timing is everything. Sorry, [the written exam is] 3.5 hours--and how I could forget that because that should have been ingrained in my mind--you do recover, so you do recover after taking the test, when you forget some of those painful details. There is a lot of preparation. In our chapter, we have an amazing set of resources in an online file that we keep and share with people who are in our study group. They also have a Facebook group that we run. And many people--in fact, the three candidates that wrote it this year that I was helping--had their own separate Facebook group. We met every two weeks starting in June, right up through till October for on study sessions, and then they had their own private study sessions as well. So there was a lot of support available for you as well. National has developed some really great webinars and that you can jump on and participate in and as they help walk you through the process. You're lucky here tonight because we do have the Chief Examiner on our panel, Alex Sevigny, and he'll be able to answer some of your questions about this. The oral exam is about a 1-hour conversation with the three selected examiners. My panel was actually from western Canada, and they did ask me one regional question for my area, which is southwestern Ontario. We discussed my work sample and they put various scenarios to me, and we had a conversation over the course of an hour. So what do APR have to say? Look at Alex, you made the PowerPoint from previous time, right? I was going to say, more hair and not grey haha. It happens to the best of us. So we're going to turn this over to our panel now and they can talk to you about some of the great resources that are available. And really, let's let's hear directly from them, because I know that information directly from your peers is probably what you're going to value most of all. So with that, I'm going to run the chat questions and turn it over to our group here. So. I guess, first of all, just to get things started and we'll start with Claire, and then go to Dustin, and then to Alex. Can you tell us your "why", what was your "why" and how and why did you decide you were ready to try and obtain your APR? [CR] I don't know if I had a very clearly defined "why", other than there always seemed from the very beginning of my career to be APRs in my universe, and they were people I respected, and for the one of the agencies I worked at early on was run by three women, two of them had their APR. So it was just sort of something I saw young, being like the career path that I admire seem to involve this step. So it was always in the back of my mind. And then, I considered it when I was, you know, in the 6-7 year mark of working and opted to do my MCM instead; I thought, I'll deal with the APR later. And then when the opportunity to continue to stay connected to my MCM classmates like Jane and people like Alex presented itself to that program, I thought that's a good time to pursue it and have a study group and some study buddies. So I went for it shortly after I finished the MCM program and got it done. Thanks, Claire. Dustin? [DM] Well, similar to Claire, people in my orbit when I was an undergrad at McMaster University, when I started out in the profession--a number of my mentors/colleagues had APRs. But it was something that I was always interested in doing. I did my master's thesis research was focused on designations in communications management, public relations, and how they're valued. I found that they were respected, as I did find later after I got the designation. But also I had my five years, I'm always one to strike when the iron's hot. I was 27-years old, I was the President of CPRS Hamilton, I was going to start teaching and I really needed a designation to prove that in addition to having the knowledge that a master's degree says, I have the competency of yes, I actually can put my theory into practice and I do have some competency in public relations. And the APR was a perfect opportunity to do that and demonstrate that. Thanks, Dustin. Alex? [AS] Yeah, I did my APR in 2011, and I did it shortly before becoming MCM director. And my main reason for doing it was to actually show that I had chops as a practitioner and not not only as an academic, because I had actually maintained a pretty active political communication practice since 2003, as a strategist and as an analyst. And I had served in various positions in mostly the provincial level up to that point, and lobbied federal. But nobody believed me because I was a professor. Somebody said, "yeah, yeah, whatever". They just let you play around over there. So I thought, this [APR] is great. This will give me credibility. And you know what, it really did. I mean, people in the practice, like business people, corporate people, government people. When they saw the APR, they said, "oh, this guy is not just all theory". "He's for real". You're the furthest from hiding away in the ivory tower that I know, Alex, you're extremely active and contributing greatly to the profession. So thank you. I'd like to switch over--we'll go back and forth between the chat questions and some of the questions that I had prepared. This is an important question right off the bat, and I think it's good to clear the air on this one. "What is the investment and time commitment per week or per month"? And I think we spelled out the financial investment, which is $495+ HST, and as well as your CPRS membership in a chapter. But as far as the time commitment, I'll speak to that first and I'll throw it to the panel. But I did just observe three people go through it, and they went through it in three very different ways. And I only got to know them in June, so I'm not sure what their time commitment was prior to that. But one of them decided to take three weeks off in October leading up to the exam. And that was a very unique approach, which was a straight-on just going to take three weeks off and study like mad, and that was that approach. Another person got married in September who was in our group, and so was very organized from when I met her in June through till September because she was studying and preparing for a wedding and then wanted to go on a honeymoon and then come back and study a little bit in October and write. So there were different approaches. For myself, I felt that I had a very intense time in December on the work sample overview and then again, an intense time in March with the Work Sample in its longer form. Now, I had a very large document that I had to condense down, so that may be different for other people. We then took a break after we found out that we passed the Work Sample [in April]. And I would say I started reading reading articles, preparing articles. We'll talk later about the binder. And it was really, I would say in August, that I thought I better get cracking and start studying very strategically in August, September, and then, of course, in October. I did take the week off leading to the exam. But that was kind of a joke, because I every day was getting called away from my studying to work, and finally took the day two days off before the exam and tried to lock myself in a study room at the university and pretended I couldn't answer the phone. And that did help. Claire, what was your time commitment for this project--while having babies? I'd say it was similar to you in that there was a push on-- I'm a deadline person--and I definitely am someone who works better under pressure. So, you know, there were a couple busy weeks leading up to the work sample overview. And I used my MCM capstone research too, like Jane's, the same idea of I was taking this huge document and trying to figure out how to condense it and also, like, fit it into the fairly prescriptive mold that you get for how everything needs to be laid out. So December, you know, there's maybe 10 days of really crazy writing time in addition to work in the holidays and all of that. Same in March. I kind of put it away and then went back to it in March and put pressure on myself to get it done and get it in on time. In terms of exam prep, I say September-- like the beginning of September--was when I really cracked down on myself. I mean, I'm really interested to hear what Alex thinks because he shepherded us through it and he may say, don't listen to those two. But, you know, Jane and I and others in our group, like we were in touch about it a whole lot. It was on the forefront of my mind, definitely like in the summer I was thinking about it. I was kind of book working articles, but I didn't really, like, put pen to paper on exam prep until beginning of September. And that's when I started. What I found was a really helpful approach, was just doing a bunch of practice exams and I started those. I think I did my first one in the first week of September and just kept doing them like almost weekly-ish, leading to the exam. [JA] Dustin and Alex, anything to add on time commitment? [DM] So I'm glad to hear how both of you approach the APR exam, really starting to prepare for the written and oral in August/September. What a lot of people hear is that, again, it's a significant time commitment, which it is. It's just you have to be wary of your time. So for December 1st, you need three names of references to agree, and you need a 300 to 500 word work sample and then you provide your work sample by the end of December, rather, and then start really thinking about the final work sample in February, March, and April. When I was in the study group, we started really meeting together and doing practice exams and weekly phone calls, I'd say, in the middle of August. And that prepared us. It is a commitment, but it won't take over your life. The important thing is just pace yourself and take it seriously, because as someone who has gone through the APR exam, as well as the CMP exam I don't know how anybody could walk into an APR written and oral exam, sight unseen, no preparation, and be able to do well. So, Pace yourself, put pen to paper--again, you're not going to be studying every day from January 1 to [October 23]--but have a plan. You're really going to start focusing on your exams around the end of August/ beginning of September. But as long as you're prepared, you've done your readings, you should do fine. [AS] You know, I'll just add that what was great about working with with Jane and Claire was that you guys are really self-driven. And, you know, when what I would tell you is don't don't look at your PD/Accreditation Chair as your teacher. Look at them as your as your facilitator, and as your kind of mentor through the process. Because they're a volunteer. And the onus really is on you to keep on track and to study. I think the time commitment, from what you guys are telling me and from what my own experience is: I think if you want to do it comfortably, it's probably 3-5 hours a week of studying. I think that's a fair assessment. And incrementalism is way better than cramming. Cramming will give you a nervous breakdown and-- you'll get, honestly-- You'll get a 10th out of it what you would if you if you kind of went at it slow and steady. So I would budget like three hours a week, five hours a week max for the long period throughout, which is, I think, exactly what Claire and Jane, you did during that period. [JA] OK, a quick question that's come up in the chat and also on my list and I think we'll clear it out of the way right now, is the question about the references. Because that's something that if you are going to go ahead, you're going to need to get on right now so that you'll have them lined up for the December 1st submission. So how do you go about finding references, two of whom are APRs? And Alex, I think I'll start with you because as National Chief Examiner, you would probably be somebody that might be called in to look at references. Can you give your advice as far as what makes the best reference and how do people get other APRs to be their reference? [AS] You know what, I mean honestly, the ideal situation is that somebody who knows you and knows your work. I was fortunate, my references were Terry Flynn was my colleague at McMaster, and Heather Pullens, sadly deceased, but she was sort of one of our early, very earliest students in the MCM program. You know, so I was fortunate that way. I think a lot of people who go through programs like master's degrees are exposed to APRs. So you have a lot of potential among your professors. But if you don't have that, what I would do is I would talk to the Accreditation Chair that's going to be running your accreditation program in your in your [CPRS] society. I'd ask them, and possibly somebody else in the society, you know. If you know somebody on the board, they don't have to be they don't have to be your your professor or your boss. Like, it doesn't have to be that intimate. Basically, they just have to say that you're an ethical person and that and that you're, you know, a serious person and that you're not going to waste your time--and in the end--anybody else's time and in attempting. That's really all they're looking for. [JA] Claire and Dustin, anything to add on how to obtain references? And Claire, maybe from speaking from the Atlantic area, how would you be able to assist people with that? [CR] You know, the conversations the Atlantic Council's had about that right now, is if we're approached by someone and this is a hurdle for them, it's really as simple as we would just sort of facilitate introductions. We represent three provinces. So would be like, "who do we know in that province that could help out" or in kind of a sector, like maybe there's a match-up where there happens to be APR, not in your province, but in your industry that you could just have a quick call with, get to know each other. It's a good connection no matter what, even if you decide not to go forward with it. It's great to make a connection with somebody. So that's what we talked about doing. And I know, too, I'm not sure if it's been updated, but there is a list of all the APRs on the CPRS website. So it might be worth just having a look. You may not think you know any, And then you look at the list and say, "oh, gee, there is someone in my community who has it [APR], who I know or know of, that I could just sort of reach out to on LinkedIn for a discussion about it". I think people are really generous with their time. so that's what I recommend. [DM] I completely agree. Look at the list of current APRs on the CPRS National website. But again, if you still need somebody, reach out to us. We're hosting this webinar right now, you have our contact information. If you're interested in taking the APR, reach out to myself, reach out to Jane, reach out to anybody you feel comfortable reaching out to. Say that you're interested in earning the APR. We could have a quick conversation, learn more about each other, why you are planning on earning this designation. But do keep in mind that the references-- you're providing CPRS National three names on December 1st, you're not providing actual written references. CPRS National is going to reach out to these three people that you've indicated and they're going to get the references directly from them. So all you really need to do between now and December 1st, or whenever you hand in those references, is provide them with a list of three names and their contact information. [JA] Thanks everyone, and to that end as well, at CPRS Hamilton, we will circulate and if there are people that we don't know who are requesting references, we will try to circulate an introduction from any potential candidate to other APRs that belong to CPRS Hamilton. And I also know that CPRS National will do that as well, that they will try to assist you in finding other APRs to be your reference. I think that that's pretty clear we are here to help you, and it's as simple as maybe exchanging a resume, having a phone call, determining how serious you are about this, because we don't--it isn't something you would just take lightly. The fact that you're all here tonight is a great indication of your interest in this. I'd like to move on to the topic of the work sample overview, because that's the other thing that would be due by the end of December. And several people have asked about the work sample and work sample overview. So just so we're clear, the overview is the short one, the 500 words-- they literally you have to do a word count on the top of your submission-- So take that seriously. And then let's talk about the topics. Sean is asking what type of work samples are required and is there a different treatment preference given to internal, external, or crisis communications? We would like to take that first from the panel. [CR] I'll give my kind of understanding of how it all works, I don't know, I found the work sample-- the summary and the overview-- I found it, once I wrap my mind around the fact that it is fairly prescriptive, like if you read through the manual-- they lay it--CPRS lays out very clearly what they're looking for. And I think for a lot of us, the instinct is to be like, how can I take this and make it better? No, you just need to follow the instructions. You have to have the word count. You have to follow the RACE formula. And once you just sort of do what's asked of you, the word count came together and all that sort of thing. So I think that's more important than whether or not it was an internal, external, or crisis project. I know Jane and I used grad school research. That's a fairly new thing for CPRS, but it seems like it's quite open to different kinds of projects. And I know I went through a lot of the samples in the library online, just to see what different people did, and it really seems to run the gamut, so I'd say pick something that you're proud of and that you put it in and that you're willing to spend a lot of time revisiting and reformatting over the next couple of months because you'll be staring at that document. Yeah, you have to be very attached to that sample, because not only will you have to write it in short for the overview and in a little bit of a longer form for the sample, you also will be asked about it in your oral exam. And it is something that is you want to feel very strongly about, and especially that it has the evaluation component. So it needs to be a sample that has a research component and has an evaluation component. And I know that that's a luxury that we don't always have in our workplace. But think about that and think about it as an award submission, right? If you've submitted to awards, things like that, you've had to follow very strict segments of the of the process. Alex or Dustin, anything about types of work samples that you would recommend. . [DM] I completely agree with Claire, it is very prescriptive, so follow the rubric--it's laid out there-- make sure that you have everything laid out in terms of... I'll speak for the broader work sample, I have it up here in front of me. You're going to have an executive summary. You're going to have Research, Analysis, Communication, and Evaluation. As part of Research, you're going to have: "what's the primary research"? "What's the secondary research"? What's an audit that you did for analysis? You're going to have your PEST analysis, SWOT analyses for Communications. What are the mediums that used for evaluation? A question was put in the chat about "what if I don't have a budget"? Calculate your hourly wage and use that if you're not able to use a budget. So I get paid, let's say $35 dollars an hour. I'm going to say that was my budget here, the hours that I worked for this amount of time, and that was part of the budget for this. And that's something I did for the written exam too, for calculating a budget which we needed to do for an aspect of it. I chose for mine. It was social media management project I did for the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. And one of the reasons why I wanted to get my APR was again, I've been involved with the CPRS for a long time, but I don't do a lot of press releases. I'm not a media spokesperson. I really do the digital side of communications with more of a marketing approach as well. And I was able to use that approach where I did a full digital and print advertising campaign with the Lubin House at Newhouse, and I made it fit into the Research, Analysis, Communications, Evaluation-- the RACE module because it was still, in its essence, communications. It's a broad practice and that worked perfectly fine. So if anybody has any concerns about, "oh, I don't have anything that was specifically straight PR", maybe it's more digital communications, maybe it's more customer service, customer communications focused. You can absolutely use those. Just make sure that it's prescriptive. It follows what they're asking you. Don't try and reinvent the work sample in this case. [JA] Thanks, Dustin Alex, just if you can also address as well the confidentiality of the work sample. That was one of the questions in the chat: is it kept confidential? I know that you can write up a you don't have to give your exact budget details, for instance. Right. You can you can create that, so to speak. Alex, you want to speak to that? [AS] Yeah, for sure. So so the examiners all and the all sign a very strict NDA, so they are bound to not reveal any of the details they read in the work samples. You can certainly request that your work sample not be posted. I, I did not because I was revealing a lot of my political communication strategy that-- because I did a case study where I helped a, I ran communications for a minister who got elected and, you know, there were just a lot of trade secrets in there. And, you know, my client was really, really uncomfortable with it ever, ever being seen with people outside of the group. So, but CPRS had no problem with that. And I can tell you that it's been 10 years and it's never leaked. So, yeah, it's people take confidentiality very seriously. [DM] And that'll add on to the work sample is on CPRS National. We have a library in Mount Royal University and we have dozens upon dozens of APR examples. Claire and Alex were discussing those you can choose to help them published. You can choose not to look at those because they all have to follow the same formula. And that's what I did when I was preparing my work sample. I read through about 15 of other people's work samples and it helped tremendously because it shows you. Exactly. What you need to follow, how integrated comms, how internal comms, how digital comms, et cetera, followed this particular work sample outline, but it also gives you. More insights for preparing it [Work Sample] for April. Yeah, I'm glad you mentioned that, Dustin, because I was also going to mention the collection at Mount Royal and actually opposite to Alex, I agreed to share my work sample into that collection. I was invited to do so. And I did do that. I happen to be married to a librarian who is very particular about issues of copyright and protection of research. And he assured me that the Mount Royal Library was following all the correct procedures. And so I was comfortable in having it posted there. So there are, through Aisling at the CPRS National or through any of us, you can access that collection and maybe you want to use it for some of your research. So I think that's a great question. Are there any other questions from the floor about work sample? I see Katrina is asking if our work sample is related to, our current position will be kept confidential. And I believe you've answered that. "Can it be an integrated communications strategy"? I guess as long as it's a full project, right. That has the four steps of the RACE formula in it. Is there anything anybody wants to add to that on the panel, Alex? [AS] Yeah, one caution with is what I've experienced both as a mentor in this in this area and as an examiner and my very brief time as examiner thus far is having having a small is beautiful. Right. You know, I think having a broad expanse of campaigns where you're heading up a national effort is actually less in your favor than somewhere where you were having a direct impact on strategic decision making, where you control budgets, where you had had input on tactics. So I would say an integrated communications campaign is as good as long as you were really the one in charge who is forming the strategy and directing the tactics. If you're not, it shines through because you start speaking in generalities and the example and then that doesn't fly solo. Always better to keep it small and all about you. [JA] Thanks, everyone. Just not to spend the whole night on the work sample. But I did just want to quickly do a sort of short snapper question to the panel, which is what was your biggest challenge in submitting your work sample overview? Just a short snapper. What was your biggest challenge, Claire? [CR] I think, again where I used my capstone research, I found it very hard to distill down at all when I started it all seemed all like 75-pages felt important to me. So to really capture it in 500 words and I think to like this happens to all of us, but like I spent, you know, most of November being like, oh, just 500 words. I'll be able to, like, fire that off in a day. And then when I sat down at the beginning of the month to actually do it, I realized it's going to be like anything a lot harder than I thought. So it's not one I would leave too late. I think I would start, you know, start thinking about what your example might be and then how you can really capture the essence of that project and your role in it, to Alex's point, in a page. And if you can't sort of easily see that, maybe you want to think about a different project. I really like how you worded that. So if you can capture the essence of the project and your role in it, your leadership role in it, try to narrow it down to that destiny. Because, I mean, I considered doing some not using my research and doing different work projects and I know the path of least resistance was using in a lot of ways my capstone, and because I could really clearly articulate my role in it, I didn't have a budget, but I could see how that could be laid out as a budget because I could I could see how it could all unfold. And that so that's like. Kind of what led me down that road versus something I was working on at work where a lot of my work projects are like. Agencies are involved or colleagues from different offices and that sort of thing, so it just seemed like something again, this was something smaller that I had a lot of all the ownership over and I felt really comfortable and confident to talk about. So it's hard to distill down. But making that kind of smaller piece of work that I had done made more sense. Dustin, your biggest challenge? Not to be all negative here, [DM] Like everybody is mentioned, the most difficult part was just taking this massive project and putting it down into-- What do I have here? 3,000 words for the project overview, executive summary of 500 words and I have here--I was one word short for each, which I'm pretty happy with. But that was that was the biggest challenge. Find something that you're comfortable with because you are going to be working on this a lot and referencing it throughout the rest of the year, but really making sure that you follow that prescribed path of the sections; RACE formula really helps you organized how much time and how many words you're going to be putting into each section. But it's something that you are going to be reviewing and massaging quite a bit. But I found that after I wrote it, I was so happy with it. I used it as an example of one of those like work portfolio samples for my agency. So it served extra uses, but it is, you will need to do a lot of finessing for it. And Alex, a quick challenge that you had, and then I'm going to ask you a couple of sort of official questions about that, for example, that have come in on the chat. [AS] It was just distilling the project down because it was big was a it was a commsfor a big political campaign and it was a complicated thing. And I had to bring it down with a lot of detail. So, like, I had to gloss over parts. And that was a hard decision, right. Because we had so many tiny little tactics that we did. Right. What what do I not put in or what do I not describe? And that was it was challenging. It was a strategic decision in and of itself. [JA] I'm not sure if anyone on the panel knows and if you know, Alex, but if not, we can get back to this person later. But the timing that the project occurred. So I know that it's a two year previous limit and then how can it actually be still in the works right now? I say it's not wrapping up until 2021 or what is the timing around it? You know what? We should probably ask Aisling Birmingham to confirm, but I know the 2-year number is is one I've heard as well. And I think--I don't know, but I mean, confronted with the goings going forward project idea, I don't know what the answer to that. [JA] OK, so sorry about that, I don't know that either, so I do know that you can go back in time up to two years. Yeah, and there was a question here about ownership. So building on this work sample discussion, how much of it has to be owned? If I was the owner of my company, but I used an agency for research or another agency for creative and distribution with that strategy that I still fought for, I'd still fall under my ownership for the purpose of the work sample. It's my understanding, and I'll throw this also to Alex and the others, but I do believe that you can use some agency work. You have to detail that in the budget. But do you want to speak to that, Alex? [AS] Sorry, could you just repeat, because I was just looking up at the 2 vs 3 year-- [JA] oh, sorry, how much ownership can you can you have you see an agency for research or could you have used an agency like, let's say you hired Leger to do alright? [AS] Yeah, that's fine. What about an agency for creative or distribution, et cetera? Totally fine. What you have to demonstrate is a strategic decision making and the fact that you had control over the budget and the fact that really the choice of tactics was yours. Right. Because that's really the key here. So if you were so fortunate as to have a budget big enough to hire Leger to do--or Nanos or whoever--to do market research for you, then that's great. I mean, you had that tactic at your disposal, right? It's kind of interesting that we mentioned Leger, because Dave Scholz from Leger, who actually was our instructor in the MCM, but he also went through the APR process with Claire and I. And so it's people of all ages, somebody as young as Dustin, who was one of the youngest in Canada, to people who are very successful executives in their organizations, may reach out and try this designation at various points in their career. So don't feel you're too old, too young ,or too much in the middle. There is a wide range of people going through the process to that end. There is a question about support and not financial support, but chapter support. So I just do want to make it clear that CPRS Hamilton does have a group I mentioned previously. We have a very nice little library of previous documents that people have put together. What we walk you through is the creating of what's called your binder. And that's it sounds very old school, but it's very helpful to have because when you go into the written exam, you are not allowed to use any electronic resources, but you can have a binder. Now, whether that will change over time, maybe Alex can speak to that. But you literally have a document. So you are--it's like an open book exam. You are allowed to take into the room with you this document, this coveted binder. And we and we reached out to people in years ahead of us as well to help us understand the best things to have in that binder, how to organize your binder. So we did spend quite a bit of the summer this year, the Hamilton Group, and talking about how we wanted to organize our binder, printing out articles, creating cheat sheets on all the various different topics and having those at our disposal so that we could quickly while actually writing the exam questions apply references to literature, references to theories, et cetera, to get the top marks possible. Does anyone else want to speak about chapter support? Alex, you certainly gave it, and you also were the recipient of it. [AS] Yeah, I mean, I was very fortunate to have to have my accreditation, sure. As Melissa McDonald, who's actually moving on to another profession now, I believe. But she was fantastic and she had regular meetings. It was almost like a study group. And then Heather Pullen ran our accreditation and also did it that way. And I kind of followed in that tradition. And I think Jane is following that tradition, to sort of regular meetings, that's really the best way. It's almost like a book club. You know, it's the best way to to to to take a run at this, I think. Right. Because setting yourself deadlines and expecting yourself to self motivate through something like this is really hard. You know, it's really-- and not only that--you get you get caught up in your own ideas. And the essence of this essence of communications is to communicate. So, you know, to you, you just being in a virtual or a real room with other people and, you know, bouncing ideas off each other is key, like, you know, and you ask questions and they come up and then, you know, the Accreditation Chair, Can clarify them with National or whoever with me, I guess, once I learn it properly. But, you know, the I think it's key to have a study group. And if you're if your association doesn't have a study group, join another association's study group. I mean, I'm sure they'll be happy to have you. You know, in Hamilton, we've often had people join us from from other associations, or who weren't affiliated because, you know, we have a robust, such a robust program. [CR] I would second that too, as somebody from New Brunswick who joined the CPRS Hamilton Study Group. I think having a group like it, it provided accountability, but also a really great camaraderie. Just everyone's in the same boat trying to figure it out and having those sessions regularly kept everyone on track and. Even sometimes I think some of our calls-- I know Jane and I certainly did calls that was just to like commiserate, but even that was helpful to move things along and keep moving forward. So nobody has to do it by themselves. And I wouldn't recommend that to anyone. I'd say if your [CPRS] chapter doesn't have a group, reach out to your chapter nonetheless. There may be enough people to start one, or they can connect you with another chapter elsewhere that has an active study group. [JA] I just want to quote Claire Ryan, who said nobody is deferring on my watch. Because it will cross your mind unless you have a serious issue, right? Dustin, if you want to add or should we carry on with some more questions? [DM] I just say, again, the study group-- not to put in financial terms-- but it was more than worth the price of the application fee, the $495, just the quality, the camaraderie. Again, I couldn't have gone through it without it. It really set the structure. And a lot of it is divide and conquer. Because we'll get assignments, we'll have people do readings and then do a background on it. So you're not responsible for reviewing everything. it's just a tremendously valuable benefit, which we're pleased to offer our members. [JA] Yes, absolutely. Alex, you might know this one, but Alison is asking if we submit our application early, such as next week, will we find out before mid-December if it has been accepted? Is it a rolling response? No? You're just on mute, Alex. [AS] No, I think it's all at once. [JA] I think you can rest assured that if you feel that you have the five years, you have the references. You're probably going to be accepted. Unless there's some question about your years of service. [AS] I just I did check that it's three years, actually [for Work Sample]. [JA] OK, that was great. I was just going to get to that because people are asking about that so you can go three years back now. [AS] It has to, it says-- I looked in the handbook-- it says candidates should note that acceptable work samples must be initiated, completed and evaluated within the three years prior to your application for eligibility. [JA] Great. So let's just shift a little bit now and talk about the exams, even though that's quite a ways that's one year from now, you guys that you know, it's 11 months from now, that'll be high on your mind. But people are asking about the exams a little bit. So, for instance, one question about accessibility and accommodation for exams. And Alex, you might know this, but when you go for your oral exam, your APR, are there accommodations for people with disabilities? You know what, that's a very good question, and it's one that we actually discussed, and to be honest with you, it's a priority for me as the chief examiner, particularly given the discussions of equity, diversity, and inclusion that are happening across the country. I know that as we kind of rethink some of the processes that that we've traditionally used to make them more inclusive and to embrace diversity, where there's going to be a bigger focus on accounting for different ways of writing the exam. I mean, it'll still happen in a place and it'll still happen ideally, you know, supervised at a computer terminal. But I think every effort will be made to accommodate. [JA] Thank you. A quick question from the chat and then I've got another one to ask for my list and then we'll see how people are feeling about if they want to rush to see CNN or not. What about the research? How in depth--from Katie-- how in depth does research component need to be for the work sample? And I know it's not fair because Claire and I both been talking about a lot of research that we would have done for a master's capstone. But if it's not that, if it's for work, what kind of research are they looking for? Alex? [AS] What kind of research in the work sample? [JA] Yeah, and how in depth does it have to be? [AS] You know, this is one of those terrible answers that people hate, but as in-depth as it needed to be. you know, so if what you're doing is is, you know, participating in the launch of a totally new campaign that's breaking new ground, whether it's something in public health during COVID. You probably will have to do quite a bit of research because there's no precedent. If what you're doing is, you know, more in the line of established precedent then, you know, your research will be more summery that way. And it'll focus more on, you know, researching the kinds of strategies and tactics that you'll use rather than doing sort of environmental scans and that sort of fundamental research that you would have to do if you're breaking new ground. So, you know, it's a tough one to answer. I would say, you know, it's the horrible answer, but it's the research that's appropriate to your case study. [JA] All right, Dustin, did you want to talk about what research--did you use your MA as well? [DM] So I used the essence of my MA. I'm looking here, and as Alex said it, it depends upon what type of role you're doing. So I'd recommend go to the work samples available at Mount Royal University and see what other research has done. I did two pages here separated by three reasons for, in this case, 1) a drop in enrollment due to the financial crisis of 20017, 2) increase in competition, 3) lack of program differentiation. I referenced my master's research where I looked at graduate credentials across Canada. It wasn't performed for Newhouse, but I had conducted the research before. And then I talked about secondary research. And I believe, Sean, you asked about this. I didn't conduct the research on behalf of the Newhouse School. They paid a firm to do this research. They got the findings. It was my role to make sense of the research that they gathered, and that's what I touched upon. And then just a slight social media audit, but two pages is what I had. But as Alex said, it depends. And as I said, refer to the samples that are available. [JA] I think what you were demonstrating was the need for the communications project. Claire, anything to add on research? [CR] No, I think, like I again, you're trying to fit that prescriptive rubric of the RACE, so I had lots I could talk about for the research, but... One of the approaches I took was just making sure I sort of had balance, in terms of how much I had in each section to the best of my ability. And I didn't have a budget. I kind of had to create something to put in there. But with different projects, like different components of the RACE model, you may be able to find yourself being able to write pages and pages on communication. But you've really got to just try to tick all four of those boxes and show that you've done every step of the project. And so I find it helpful just to try to make sure that they were all sort of similar, in, not necessarily word count, but in what I was capturing for each. Like beginning, middle, end of each section was there. [JA] Thank you, so we've been at this for about an hour, which makes me think that it's time to ask the work-life balance question, because I'm sure like everyone on this call, you probably worked all day today, too. And it was a gorgeous day in southern Ontario. And you probably thought "I should have gone for a walk" instead. And here we are keeping you late at night. But let's can we just briefly, any tips for work-life balance? Because I really don't want to dampen the enthusiasm any of you who are considering pursuing your APR, because we're all stronger when we have a stronger APR community across Canada and we know what that designation stands for. And I certainly, when I'm posting for jobs at King's [University College], I'm definitely looking for those credentials. So work-life balance. Any comments on that? Alex has just written a great blog about achieving work-life balance during the pandemic. Alex, do you want to talk about work life balance from your perspective? Because you do a lot. [AS] Sure, I don't know if it's the best example, because my work-life balance is kind of like 90-10 work and 10 life, but it's what I enjoy, to be honest with you. So it's not a labour for me. I think my best advice about work-life balance is to find the balance that works for you. So for me, it's a lot of work and a little bit of life. For some people, it's the opposite. And what you kind of have to figure out, with APR is, does it fit into the work part or the life part? And is it something that you're enjoying or is it something that you're perceiving that you have to do? Because if it's like if you treat it like something that you really want to do, that you're enjoying doing that you look forward to doing that. You are having fun with. Meeting your fellow candidates, improving yourself, personal growth-- all that good stuff. Then it'll fit into your work-life balance. It'll just happen. Because you'll make it happen. If you perceive it as drudgery and something that you have to do and that is imposed upon you, or that you're imposing upon yourself psychologically, I think then it'll be harder. So for me, the angle of attack on the project is really important. That's what I would say. [JA] Claire, you've got a busy life. What do you think? [CR] I actually really like the way Alex just summarized it. This is not something I did-- Like, I don't think-- my employer didn't expect it. They didn't even really know. They were not that tuned in that I was doing it, I think, until after I got it. For me, it was part of the work thing because professional development is important. And I wanted to stay connected. I wanted to become more involved with CPRS. I like you know, I wanted this other designation. So it was something I personally really wanted versus feeling obligated. And that, you know, is an important motivator, I think, for these kinds of things. And it made-- It made, even in the stressful tense times, It was still like. I found some found some fun of it, you know, we had some fun calls and even when we felt under the gun. And I really liked actually Alex's advice at the top of the call around taking 3-5 hours a week from the beginning. I wish I had done that. I didn't. I say that's like a "do as I say, not as I did". And I mean, it's a year-long process, but in the grand scheme of things, it's not. A year goes by really quickly. Like, it's crazy to me that it's already been a year since we finished. So it's one of those like short-term pain, long-term gain situations. I had to give up some evenings and some Saturdays and Sundays during exam prep, but not forever. And that's just kind of what I told myself at the time last September and October. I was like, I'll do this now and then-- never again. And so keep that perspective, it's a long year because it's drawn out and there are these dates that span the calendar, but it's not really that long, really. [DM] Yep, and as everyone said, again, it is a year, but again, look at the deliverables. You have: the work sample due April,. so you're really going to start thinking about that in February/March. The exam is going to be in October. So you're really going to start focusing on that in August and September and then beginning of October. It is an investment of time, but it's not going to take over your life. Did I have to head to Hamilton for a few Saturdays in a row for study sessions? Yes, but I had a great cohort and we had great camaraderie. So it was useful in that respect, too. But just pace yourself. If you're part of a study group, part of the structure of the pacing will be put forward to you. But again, at the end of the-- in one year--once October's done, you get this nice certificate here and it is entirely worth it. If you're thinking about it, if you already have a master's degree and you're still thinking, "do I need an APR"? You do. It's important. If you're already thinking, you've kind of made that decision already. But a master's degree, academic degree, is great to demonstrate that you have strong certified knowledge in a certain field, e.g., public relations, communications management. As Alex said at the beginning of this, an APR is more-- you're putting that theory into practice. You have the chops. And my master's degree wasn't able to demonstrate that to my students. The APR was. And I'm very happy I went through the process, even if I did go through as early as I did, because it's over for me now. I have it. I've gained all of the experience from it as well. It was a full year, but it was a very valuable year. [JA] Thanks. And speaking of investment, there were a couple of questions in the chat about money other than application and membership fees--are there any additional fees? My answer to that is no, and I believe that's correct. Right, Alex? There are no other fees? [AS] No, no official ones. But there are a couple of costs you might incur. Like you'll have to, you'll probably, you might buy some books, possibly you might spend some money on paper. I mean, just to be a completist about it, about the cost. One thing I recommend to people, is the night before the exam maybe check yourself into a hotel if you have a noisy house. If you have that luxury to be able to do that, just so you get a good night's sleep and you know, nobody says anything upsetting to you in the morning. So there might be a few other expenses here and there, but the fundamental is just the $495. [JA] And I think those are some good points. Like you might also need to use some of your vacation time from work. So I did save up a week off, to the week leading up to the exam was supposed to be my vacation time. Or if you get professional development, leave time from work, you might want to start planning to save up some of that, although I guess we don't really have much use for our vacation time right now anyway. And the other expense also, if you do care to go to the National Conference the year after you get your APR, you are presented with it at the National Conference, which we--Claire and I've been to two of them, in PEI and Edmonton. And we did see our colleagues receive their APR at both conferences. And that's quite a nice occasion. You do get a lovely pin as well. And then to maintain your APR, you do have to maintain your membership in CPRS. So that would be an ongoing expense. Somebody has asked, is the fee refundable in case of not passing the work sample? I believe you can defer and you can resubmit your work sample one year later. How does that work, Alex? [AS] Again, I have to check the details, because I'm new to this, too, but I believe that there's a submission process. But you know what, before I can commit to an answer on that, let me get back to you on that one. I do know that if you defer to a certain point and ask, to say write it next year, like let's say you've passed your work sample and then but you can't write the exams, I believe you have one more year to write the exams.. But I'm not sure if there's a supplemental fee or not. There's a question: are there suggested study and reading lists? I know yes there are definitely. In our, at least in our chapter in Hamilton, we have a lot of suggested reading lists and so does the National website. Is there anything anybody wants to add to that on the panel? [CR] Start with the manual that's online, make that your first. And read it cover to cover, it really spells out a lot of it. I kept it in my binder, like I just found it was a good reference document to have throughout the year. And those lists and all that-- a lot of what we've talked about in terms of the Mount Royal library and formatting and RACE model is all in there. [JA] OK, great. There still is another question, just a clarification on how much ownership of the project you have to have. Alex, do you have any further clarification on how much of the project you have to actually own in order to submit it as an example? [AS] You know, there's a measure of subjectivity there, but you have to be the principal in the project, really. Like you, you have to be the strategic decision-maker. You have to be choosing tactics. You have to have a hand in setting and managing the budget. And, you know, to be the person who's doing all those three things, it pretty much has to be-- you have to have some sort of managerial role on the project. That doesn't mean you have to be a manager to qualify, but the project has to be something that you've run. Otherwise, it doesn't sound credible or authentic. [JA] Question for the written exam. "Assume it's done with a word processor of some sort--are there tools like spell check disabled"? You know, if you make typos in the written exam, will you fail because of a couple of spelling errors? "How much editing would we be doing as part of the test"? I do know that I wrote mine remotely. I didn't go into the examination center. Dustin, you probably went into the examination center. And now with COVID, everyone's writing it remotely with online proctoring. And also so I had to have a proctor who was a person who worked at the university. I had to book an examination room. I had to submit to CPRS: where that room was located, who the proctor was. They sent the exam to the proctor. That person monitored me and I wrote it on my own laptop. But I had to pledge-- which is part of the whole ethical reason for being an ethical practitioner and having your APR is--that I was not using any outside resources besides my binder. I did definitely-- I was very, very observant of any typos-- but I guess I'm vigilant in that from the days of being a journalist where that was drilled into me. But anyone else want to comment on that as far as the technicality of writing the exam? [CR] I know that we just planned-- it's a timed exam, but-- in planning the writing of the exam we filled in some time for editing, reviewing your own work. I was like Jane and I wrote mine remotely. I was in a university conference room here in New Brunswick and I had the luxury because I was in a room by myself. I'd like, just write my answer and then read it aloud to myself and caught a bunch of things and move on to the next. And but just like if you're going to give yourself 45-minutes to write for a section, make 5-10 minutes of that your review and edit time. So I think you do lose points for spelling and grammar. You'd hate to lose marks on that if you can avoid it. [JA] Yeah, definitely. And we do have it all mapped out for exactly how many minutes you should spend on each question. And I literally had my phone timer go off and I would stop exactly at that time until I got through the whole exam with 10-minutes here, 90-minutes here, all these timed out sections, which we will give you those times. And then the last half-hour was for editing and reviewing. [DM] And I wrote it in person, so I sat an exam room proctored at McMaster, there was another person writing it to the side of me. It was kind of those partitioned walls that we had. And we were writing it on word processors, on the university's own computers. It was Microsoft Word. I saw the red underlines. I saw the blue underlines for grammar--had all of that. But the most important part is the content. I think I finished 3h 15 minutes in. I had 15 minutes left to kind of review. I really didn't want to review. So I looked for the most jarring things. But content's important. So if you are reaching the end of a section, your timer is about to go off-- And again, there's not a timer set for each section that are hard and fast, It's more so you can keep on your own kind of pace for the exam-- If you need to write things down quickly or just go into bullet points, it's better to have the content there than to have it absent. And I had to bullet-point a few things myself. So was it perfect? No, but I got the content there and that's the key thing. [JA] Alex, can you just speak to the overall pass rate? I mean, how stringent--how many people write it, how many people pass it? Do you have that kind of data? [AS] I don't think we actually disclose that data, to be honest with you. But I can check to see whether we can start doing that. my sense is that the majority of people... I'll put it this way: if you take it seriously and if you put in an effort and you think about it positively and you prepare the right way, there's no reason you shouldn't pass. On the writing thing-- just briefly--remember that PR pros and communicators in general, creative professionals, they're often the word nerds and grammar geeks. and, you know, while we forgive ourselves, our typos when we make them, we tend to be very less forgiving of other people when they do it. So, you know, it's kind of part of the writer's craft. When you want to try to make your career, your document is as clean as possible. But as Dustin said, I would always favour content over being persnickety about that. [JA] so we are almost and I think we are at 1.5 hours now, which I think is a pretty, very generous of the panelists to give this amount of time. Thank you all very much. I think I've covered everything in the chat. Is there anyone that wants to just turn off their mic and ask a quick question that hasn't been asked? [CR] Jane, the question that just came in I think it's worthwhile addressing Emily about whether or not, If you don't have a graduate degree or formal PR education, I don't think you need it. Like this is a panel, people who all have master's degrees. But in the conversations I've had with friends and colleagues around here, as I'm trying to encourage them to go for the APR, I think having like years of experience is what's most important. And you can learn the theory, you can do the studying, but like I think especially with the written exam, some of the questions, what you're going to rely on is your own lived experience, having worked in PR and things you've done or things you've been a part of. I would say, like my recommendation to Emily, I'd say maybe go for your APR. And if you really enjoyed spending the year doing the reading, getting prepped and you found it valuable and a good use of your time, then maybe you want to consider a graduate program after that. But this is definitely faster, cheaper way to test that out. And you still get your designation at the end of it. Is was just going to say there is the PRK, which is kind of like if you want to test yourself to see how you do in exams, et cetera, there is the PRK. [DM] I was just going to say, in terms of formal education and PRK, I know this because I researched it, but until 2007 there really were no formal bachelor's, master's degrees in communications management or public relations. And the APR has been offered since, I believe, 1968. So you definitely don't need formal education in PR, but that five years of experience really does matter. And the 5+ years-- Alex, I think this is a good question for you to answer. [AS] I think the APR is, the whole point of the APR is to give you credibility if you don't have that formal education. so because a lot of people were coming in from journalism or from creative writing or theater and film or, you know, sort of teaching backgrounds or in a more the IR vein, a lot of people were coming in from finance and they didn't really have a way of saying, "hey, I'm a I'm a competent communicator". And the APR was the way that the Public Relations Society of America, when they invented it, I think it was in 63, I could be wrong. That was their solution to that credibility gap. So don't feel at all stopping if you don't have the education in PR. That's what it's for--the APR. [JA] And you do have a whole year to access a lot of great readings. The way that they grade the exam, questions are tiered. So the people that add more references to literature, etc. and maybe reference theories, et cetera, will get higher marks. But there still is an acceptable mark without a lot of theories. I think we're good to go here, somebody is just asking, "can the 5 years be a combination of part-time and full-time work in the profession"? [AS] Good question. I think there's a measure of flexibility there. [JA] All right, well, I see no other questions. We do have this recording, we will figure out a way to share this through our social media and or the CPRS website, Hamilton chapter website, possibly, Dustin. And thank you all, but really thank you to the panel, you guys have given it all to CPRS and to the APR, and then to come out again tonight and share your knowledge is really the true sign of a pro. . So thank you on behalf of everyone here tonight. And with that, I will wrap it up. Hi, lovely to see you guys. Have a good night.