Direct mailer and understanding stakeholders

For this assignment of PR pubs, I was ask to design a direct mailer to bring in more students to the University of Oklahoma. In order to do this, however, I had to first figure out what kind of student I wanted to reach out, and understand all the types of stakeholders with whom the University of Oklahoma can communicate.

Since I was able to kind of decide the demographics I wanted to focus on, I chose to go toward a less targeted yet just as important type of student. I went with students in the Oklahoma City metro area, more specifically, high schools students form the Oklahoma City Public Schools. The student I’d like to reach out to would be 16 to 18 years of age, with accepted ACT scores, from a middle to lower income class and first generation.

I know from personal experience that as a first generation student, it is difficult to get informed on things like financial aid as well as financial opportunity, when the process of taking ACT/SAT exams and applying to college is already overwhelming enough. For me, money was a big factor I considered and pondered over, even after I got accepted at OU.

The direct mailer would mostly focus on scholarship and financial aid information, and although it is addressed to the student, I’d like to speak to parents in some small way. A student with the background I set up would still be likely to be highly influenced by parents, friends and other close family members. Of these options, parents are the easier influencers to include when reaching out to the students.

As for the income, with the exception of very few schools, the Oklahoma City Public School system sits in the area of middle to lower income families and is also more ethnically diverse, opening for the probability of more first generation students such as myself.

I know the University puts a lot of focus on National Merit Scholars, athletes and international students. Nevertheless, I know there is a lot of potential in this demographic that is being lost by perhaps a lack of understanding this public.