Industry voices push deeper campus–employer ties for Jamaica’s PR and news talent

KINGSTON, Jamaica — Practitioners and lecturers say universities, hiring organisations and Corporate Jamaica must work more tightly together so communications students leave campus ready for a sector transformed by artificial intelligence, thinner newsrooms and shifting audience habits.

That message dominated a Brand Builders Live conversation convened by BrandCamp organiser Kalando Wilmoth with Red Stripe under the banner “The Future of PR: A Journalist’s Perspective”. Editors, reporters, teachers and PR professionals weighed whether degrees still matter, how internships are designed, and whether graduates enter journalism, public relations and corporate communications with enough on-the-job grounding.

Panellists broadly accepted that the field is moving faster than many syllabuses, but they split on how much formal credentials still count. Our Today Chief Executive Officer Al Edwards maintained that a degree still marks discipline and the capacity to finish a structured course.

“A degree shows you can complete a process, remain disciplined, and achieve goals,” Edwards said. “From there, we can work with you.”

Jamaica Observer Business Content Manager Dashan Hendricks countered that paper qualifications alone do not predict who will thrive in journalism.

“I’ve supervised journalists without degrees who became my best reporters. It’s not the degree, it’s the person,” Hendricks said. He recalled that a number of well-regarded Jamaican journalists learned through apprenticeships and grew their craft inside newsrooms.

Senior Associate Editor for Lifestyle at the Jamaica Observer Novia McDonald-Whyte argued the conversation should move past credentials to whether newcomers bring the specialised grasp needed for harder beats. Lifestyle reporting, she said, demands fluency in food, design, fashion, travel and culture—not merely covering events and personalities.

“You have to be well read,” McDonald-Whyte said, stressing that subject mastery now matters as much as writing craft.

Speakers also asked whether placements arrive too late in degree programmes, leaving little room to test classroom lessons in real workplaces. Hendricks floated formal alliances among universities, media houses and Corporate Jamaica from earlier in a student’s course. Extended stints, he said, would build hands-on skill while letting employers help shape new talent.

BroadTail Designs Managing Director Dania Beckford likewise urged a stronger national internship framework. Panellists said campuses cannot carry the burden alone while technology and business models keep rewriting the skills employers want, and they pressed students to drive more of their own growth.

Jamaica Observer Social Media Editor Sandena James advised would-be communicators to track the news, research target workplaces and learn the products those outfits publish.

“Feed yourself with information. Take the initiative. Get acquainted with the product,” James said.

The session closed on shared duty: universities updating curricula, employers offering serious workplace exposure, and students chasing knowledge and practice beyond lectures. Speakers framed the task as building a pipeline that delivers practical ability, specialised insight and flexibility—not merely larger graduating classes—for an industry in flux.