{"id":13334,"date":"2021-10-28T09:31:43","date_gmt":"2021-10-28T13:31:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/?p=13334"},"modified":"2022-04-18T12:38:33","modified_gmt":"2022-04-18T16:38:33","slug":"alumni-kim-smith","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/news\/alumni-kim-smith\/","title":{"rendered":"From URI to the NFL: Kim Smith ’15 on Putting Public Relations into Practice"},"content":{"rendered":"

According to ESPN, the opening week of the National Football League\u2019s (NFL) games this past September drew an average of 17.4 million viewers across television and digital platforms. For those 17.4 million viewers, media coverage of their favorite teams and rivals \u2013 from weekly press releases covering records and stats to social media posts capturing players\u2019 personalities and game day enthusiasm \u2013 is paramount to following the season. Enter Kim Smith \u201915, a public relations major who also minored in communication studies. She\u2019s now in her fifth season working in the NFL and her third season working as the Media Relations Coordinator<\/a> for the Tennessee Titans. \u201cIt\u2019s my job to put the players and coaches in the best possible light while also helping the media execute their jobs,\u201d she says. \u201cI enjoy making sense out of the chaos.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before the \u201chype and glitz of the NFL,\u201d as she describes it, Smith was an active student in the Harrington School of Communication and Media<\/a>. Drawn to the campus because \u201cit felt big enough, but there was still a sense of community,\u201d she got involved with the Public Relations Student Society of America and completed internships with ESPSN Milwaukee, the Providence Bruins, and Regan Communications. She credits these experiences with preparing her for her fast-paced career, noting that while they exposed her to production, broadcasting, marketing, and other fields related to her career, they also helped foster the \u201cintangible qualities\u201d crucial to her success now such as time management and attention to detail.<\/p>\n

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While these hands-on experiences provided her with an important foundation, she also notes: \u201cThe courses I took through the Harrington School exposed me to a number of different facets of the industry and taught me skills that helped me get to where I am today. The sports film course I took helped me tap into the human side of sports media \u2013 dissecting what messaging we as human beings learn from sports, how sports help us build camaraderie and coexist, and how the cooperation required of being on a team can translate into the real world.\u201d As for two other important classes, she remembers: \u201cI took a copywriting class that has helped me in my current role as I work with media and journalists daily. I have a good understanding of AP style, headline writing, and other publication-related communication. And a business communications class is probably one of the most important courses I took, where I learned one of the most invaluable skills for a PR pro: how to write professional emails.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for advice she\u2019d give current students, Smith hones in on two important activities: networking and interning. \u201cThe year after I graduated URI,\u201d she says, \u201cI was doing a ton of informational interviews, reaching out to industry pros who held roles I could see myself doing, when one person I was chatting with suggested I look for volunteer opportunities within the sports world to get my foot in the door. While inquiring about volunteer opportunities, I was informed about an opening on a game day staff, which I\u2019m not sure I would have known about without talking to people. My career truly stemmed from a simple networking call.\u201d<\/p>\n

-By Anna Gray<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kim Smith \u201915 majored in public relations and minored in communication studies. She’s now in her fifth season working in the National Football League and her third working as Media Relations Coordinator for the Tennessee Titans. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1089,"featured_media":13335,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[73,106],"class_list":["post-13334","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-harrington-school-of-communication-and-media","tag-public-relations"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13334","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1089"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13334"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13334\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13854,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13334\/revisions\/13854"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13335"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13334"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13334"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.uri.edu\/artsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13334"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}