LCOMM300 is designed to encourage each student to fulfil their potential in contributing towards designing a communication strategy for a client. The paper asks students to work individually and in teams (agencies) on a communication project integrating and synthesising what they have learnt throughout the course of their study. The purpose of this paper is fourfold:

1. To allow students to demonstrate their knowledge about important topics and theories previously covered in other courses in public relations, marketing, and leadership communication.
2. To allow students to demonstrate their understanding of these topics and theories by putting them into practice for a real client.
3. To prepare students for working in the world of communication where practitioners need to possess communicative and planning skills.
4. To allow students to reflect on this capstone experience.

The paper will be conducted through a mixture of lectures (online), tutorials, and guest speaker experiences.

There is one one-hour lecture (online recording) and you should also attend one two-hour tutorial per week (tutorials start in week 2). You will need to choose to attend either an online or a face to face tutorial. In the first seven weeks of the semester (until the teaching recess) work will focus on research, identifying purpose, objectives, and targets. The second part of the semester will focus on tactics and developing messages. At the end of the semester, in the last week of classes, teams will present their communication strategy to the client (delivery will be online or in class, TBA).

Content will focus on communication strategy concepts, leading students to:

1. Recognize the importance of research, including demonstrating the importance of understanding the communication context.
2. Demonstrate their understanding of positioning, identifying communication objectives and target public(s)
3. Demonstrate an ability to formulate messages and choose communication channels
4. Recognise the legal, ethical and risk components of designing a communication strategy
5. Acquire an ability to nurture and build relationships with a range of stakeholders
6. Understand the human and financial requirements for a strategic communication plan.

Lecture notes and recordings, tutorial notes, grading criteria for assignments and other documents provided by the client will be available on Moodle. The convenor will remind you in class and by email/Moodle announcement when these are available.

General assessment guidelines:

Activities and assignments are designed to help you achieve the learning outcomes of this course. Written assignments are to be web-submitted unless otherwise notified under the assignment description. They will be passed through the antiplagiarism software “Turnitin” (see plagiarism section). To avoid plagiarism, you must not pass other people’s work off as your own without proper acknowledgement and appropriate referencing. In addition, you must not use assignments or parts of assignments assessed in other papers for credit in this paper. You cannot resubmit assignments from your past course work if you are repeating this paper. When you web submit, please use a file name that gives the name of the assignment and your name. For example Essay Joe Bloggs.docx would be a good file name. Please avoid apostrophes and ampersands (&) as the system cannot open the files and hence we will not be able to mark your work.

Presentation of written assignments:

Unless otherwise stated, written assignments should:

1. Have a front cover sheet which indicates the name of the paper and course code, your name and ID number, your tutor’s name, the due date, and a word count.

2. Use 12 point font, Times New Roman.

3. Use one and a half spacing and left justification.

4. Leave margins of 2.54 cm so that your marker has space to write comments.

5. Number pages beginning with the first page of text.

6. Use proper paragraphing. Leave a blank line between paragraphs or indent the first line.

7. Follow the APA referencing system. See the library APA referencing website to check your referencing at: http://www.waikato.ac.nz/library/study/guides/apa.shtml

8. Be within the word limit (plus or minus 10%). Your word count does not include your title page, your reference list or any appendices.

9. Demonstrate evidence of revision and proofreading.

Please see below under 'Assessment components' for a precise description of the various elements of the assessment.

Other important points to note:

Attendance and participation: This paper requires every student to actively participate in all activities. This means that you should review lectures and attend tutorials. Other students in the class depend on you to fulfill your responsibilities as a team member and to be available for consultation and team meetings (teams will be formed in the first tutorial, week 2).

Communication and peer evaluation: Good communication and collaboration is essential in this course. In order to make sure every member contributes equally to the team's effort, you will be asked to assess your own contribution as well as that of your team members in the agency (see peer evaluation). This evaluation will have an impact on your report mark so it is in your interest to work as a team from the start and contribute and share the workload equally.

Lecture notes and resources such as extra readings or videos will be accessible from the course page. More details will be given in class.

All lectures will be recorded and made available on moodle. The convenor will remind you in class and by email/moodle announcement when these are available.

You are expected to review lecture material and attend one two-hour tutorial every week (online or offline).

Please note: tutorials start in week 2 for this course.

In addition you are asked to read one chapter from Smith R. D (2017) on average every second week to complement or reinforce what has been covered in class. You are also expected to spend about 3 hours a week to plan and prepare strategy with your team outside class times (this will vary depending on what needs to be achieved every week).