Primary Research Group has published The Survey of Public Relations Practices in Higher Education, 2014 Edition, ISBN 978-1-57440-283-4. 

This 130-page report gives extensive data and commentary of how colleges and universities are handling their public relations practices and presenting themselves to the broader public. 

The study enables its readers to answer questions such as: How much are colleges spending on public relations? How large are their public relations staffs? How many press releases do they send out and how many are via email and how many via post? How do colleges publicize faculty research? How many media interviews for faculty and staff do different types of colleges set up annually? How do colleges use video and photography in college promotion and public relations? What is the role of the public relations department in the college's website management and social media presence? How many man hours of labor is the college marketing and PR staff devoting to the college's social media presence? Does the college use outside public relations firms?

The study also provides commentary from college public relations directors and others involved in the college public relations effort about how they are presenting their efforts to college management, how they are using social media and other emerging channels, and how they use video and photography in their PR efforts. 

Just a few of the report's many findings are that:

• The colleges in the sample issued a mean of 182 press releases for all purposes in the past year. The median was slightly lower than this at 150, and the range was from a minimum of 10 to a maximum of 1,200.
• The research universities in the sample set up a mean of 519 media interviews for faulty and staff in the past year.
• The private schools in the sample spent a mean of $17,750 on outside public relations firms in 2013.
• 55.6 percent of colleges with more than 6,000 students (FTE) employ a service to track their college's appearance in the media.

The study is available directly from Primary Research Group and also from major distributors of books and research reports. Print and PDF versions are available for $129.00. Site licenses are also available. For a table of contents, list of tables, free excerpt, and participants list, visit our website at www.PrimaryResearch.com.