Table of ContentsI. Project Summary..................................................................3

Increasing Participation of Southern Indiana

Caddies

Jonathon Orr V-436 12/01/2014

Goals

Objectives

Mission Statement

Target Audience

II. Elevator Speech....................................................................5

Example

III. Communication Approaches.................................................6

Audience Justification

Project Goals

Strategy #1

Strategy #2

Sample

IV. Time Line............................................................................11

Short-Term

Long-Term

Why Does this Even Matter?

V. Class Content......................................................................14

Exercise Summary

VI. Works Cited........................................................................15

Project Summary

GoalsThe goal of this plan to raise awareness and participation of the Evan Scholar Foundation to

potential candidates throughout Southern Indiana.

Objectives Visit golf courses around Indiana to gain traction and support for the creation of caddie

programs.

Visit schools in communities surrounding golf courses with existing caddie programs.

Revisit high schools who have access to newly created caddie programs.

Mission StatementFounded in 1899, the Western Golf Association conducts world-class championships for

professional and amateur golfers, promotes the use of caddies and oversees the Evans Scholars

Foundation that awards college scholarships – including full tuition and housing – to caddies

with limited financial means.

Target AudienceThe target audience for this communication plan are male and female high school students

located in Southern Indiana that are planning to attend college and potential caddies that are of

freshmen or sophomore standing located in Southern Indiana that are planning to attend college.

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The requirements for the scholarship includes at least two years of caddie experience,

outstanding character, great academics and proof of limited financial resources (“Who We Are”).

Current Male and Female Caddies

o In high school standing

o That plan to attend an in state college

o With at least a B average GPA

o That demonstrate financial need

o Possess outstanding character, integrity, and leadership

o That live in Southern Indiana

Potential Male and Female Caddies

o Be in freshman or sophomore high school standing or middle school (to earn

at least 2 years of experience)

o That plan to attend an in state college

o With at least a B average GPA

o That demonstrate financial need

o Possess outstanding character, integrity, and leadership

o That live in Southern Indiana

The secondary audience for this plan are parents of current caddies, parents of potential caddies,

teachers, principals, club professionals, caddie masters, and golf course managers. From my

personal experience I know that the influence of the secondary audience can be quite effective.

Parents

Teachers

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Principals

Golf Professionals of Southern Indiana Golf Courses

Caddie Masters

Managers of Southern Indiana Golf Courses

Elevator Speech

This elevator speech is intended to be used by the Evans Scholar Foundation when speaking to

potential caddies and candidates.

ExampleWhat if I told you that you could attend a Big 10 University and graduate completely debt

free? What if I told you that you would be paid to earn a scholarship during the summer? If this

seems like a great opportunity to you, you could be eligible for the Chick Evans Caddie

Scholarship. The Evans Scholarship is a non-profit organization that strives to send deserving

caddies to college. Over 200 caddies are sent to 14 different scholarship houses across the

country every year. The requirements for this tremendous scholarship are simple: you must

caddie for at least 2 years, have a B high school average, demonstrate financial need, and possess

outstanding character.

The Evans Scholar Foundation is not just a scholarship, it’s an invaluable reward with

endless opportunities. After receiving the Evans Scholarship you will have the chance to network

with thousands of past alumni and multiple top 40 company executives. The scholarship will

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connect you to the people who can further your career the most. Don’t let this opportunity slip

away!

Southern Indiana caddies are in great demand. Your chances for earning this scholarship

have never been better! Contact your local golf course today for more information about how to

start caddying. If you are interested in applying for the scholarship you can visit the Western

Golf Associations website at WWW.wgaesf.org to apply online .

Communication Approaches

Audience JustificationThe primary audience for this communication project are college bound high school

students. These students will be required to have at least 2 years of caddie experience before they

are eligible for the scholarship. To further narrow down our audience, we can say that unless the

student is already a caddie they must be a freshmen or sophomore. The scholarship selection

process takes upwards of 6 months; this makes it possible to become a caddie while you are a

sophomore and still be able to complete the application before the end of your junior year.

The caddies of Southern Indiana are extremely deserving candidates. According to a

poverty study performed by the Applied Research and Education Center at the University of

Southern Indiana, the poverty rate for Southern Indiana has risen by almost 60% from 2000 to

2010 (Bielman). This devastating statistic reveals the reality of this growing problem. I have

personally chosen to target this audience because of my firsthand knowledge and experience of

being a caddie from Southern Indiana. I can personally say that I am very fortunate for being

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selected for this scholarship and I wish to extend this invaluable experience to more people from

my region.

Project Goals1. The first quantifiable goal of this project is to increase the amount of Southern Indiana

Evans Scholars by five in the timeframe of two years. This will result in a history of

helping a total of ten deserving caddies from Southern Indiana.

2. The second goal is to develop and create at least two new caddie programs south of

Indianapolis in two years.

Strategy #1One approach to spread the awareness of the Chick Evans Caddie Scholarship in Indiana

is to increase the amount of caddie programs throughout the state. This will not only increase the

total amount of caddies in Indiana, it will increase the number of potential candidates as well.

This can be accomplished by visiting golf courses throughout the state and demonstrating to

them the benefits a caddy program can add to their course. This approach would be reaching the

secondary audience and is a way to penetrate the circles of communication as described by Bonk

in the book titles Strategic Communications for Nonprofits. The Evans Scholar Foundation will

need to strategically approach how they communicate their intentions to the golf course

managers. As can be expected, the golf courses will be hesitant about starting a program with the

risks and costs associated with it. A persuasive speech should rely on ethos, pathos, and logos to

sufficiently address all the benefits a caddie program could provide (Jones). I suggest that the

Western Golf Association appeal to the secondary audience (golf course managers) through

ethos by having the person presenting the information an Evans Scholar Green coat (employee)

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or even a caddie from Southern Indiana. Appealing to the audience’s ethos will establish a

connection with them on a personal level and will help to build credibility just as Aristotle did

with his students (Jones). Next, the presentation must connect with the audience’s pathos or

emotions. The best way to do this is to explain how the organization has helped send thousands

of deserving caddies to school all across the nation. I suggest that if a past Southern Indiana

Caddie is presenting that they tell their own personal story about receiving the scholarship and

how it has helped them. The connection the audience can make with example is that a problem

exists, it affects the community where I live, and that I can become a solution. Lastly, the

presentation must appeal to the audience’s logos by explaining the benefits the program will

have on their image. For example, implementing a program that offers deserving caddies a full-

ride scholarship to a major university will draw attention to not only the Evans Scholar

Foundation, but to the sponsoring course as well. The increased publicity can be quite beneficial

and could increase the number of players that choose to play at the course. This example uses a

mix of inductive and deductive reasoning (Jones). The Evans Scholar Foundation is good, our

course supports and sponsors them, therefore we are good (Jones).

Strategy #2Another step to increase awareness and participation of the Chick Evans Caddie

Scholarship in Indiana is to reach out to potential candidates. This can be done by traveling to

high schools around Indiana to talk to potential candidates and potential caddies. The goal of this

step would be to simply educate potential applicants about the scholarship and the opportunities

it provides recipients. As mentioned above and quite possibly using the same examples, this

presentation must appeal to the audience’s pathos, ethos, and logos (Jones). The presenter must

also make their points “stick” with the audience. The reading titled Going Public… by Herbert

Simons and Jean Jones, mentions that a deliverable must contain six “sticky points” to be

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effective. The first point is simplicity. I suggest that listing the requirements for the scholarship

and explaining how each item can be obtained and access will help to make the application

process more appealing. Next, the message must be unexpected. This can be accomplished by

simply explaining how you can earn full-ride scholarship while being paid. The aspect of not

requiring large amounts of hard to achieve things makes the scholarship surprising and

interesting to people. The third point is that the ideas must be concrete. An example of this

would be to list the accomplishments past scholars have achieved such as jobs, awards, and

degrees. The Evans Scholar Foundation could also use the internally generated statistics

revolving around graduation percentages and GPA averages to establish that they represent an

educational institution. The fourth aspect is the message must be believable. I suggest that the

presenter tell a personal story about how the scholarship has affected their life and how they

were once in the same position as them. The fifth element is emotional. Again, this emotional

connection could be established by the presenter telling a personal story about their scholarship

experience. Lastly, the speech must contain stories. After the presenter tells his own personal

story they could go into further details about the incredible story behind the Evans Scholars

Foundation and how it was created. This approach not only targets the primary audience, it

targets the secondary audience as well. The goal of reaching the secondary audience is to reach

one of the innermost circles of communication, family and relatives (Bonk pg. 53). Educating the

parents of potential and current caddies will increase the chances that potential candidates follow

through with the application process (Bonk pg. 53). The process for analyzing and processing

these audiences is called audience mapping (Garnet pg. 42). This process includes immediate

audiences or the people who the message is designed for, the primary audience or caddies that

decide to apply for the scholarship, and the secondary audience who are the people who are

affected by the actions of the primary audience, such as parents (Garnet pg. 42). The very last

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step in reaching this audience is providing a flyer or brochure with most important information

listed.

SampleShown below is an example of what a flyer or brochure could communicate to potential

candidates and caddies.

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Time Line

Short-Term

Year 1

2nd Quarter:

Contact potential golf courses about caddie programs.

Locate and contact schools surrounding golf courses with existing golf caddie programs.

3rd Quarter

Tour Indiana visiting selected golf courses demonstrating the benefits of a caddie

program.

4th Quarter

Visit schools surrounding golf courses with existing golf caddie programs to spread

awareness to high school students.

Midpoint Evaluation evaluating progress thus far.

Year 2

2nd Quarter

Revisit golf courses to encourage growth and show support.

Visit schools surrounding golf courses with newly implemented golf caddie programs.

3rd Quarter

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Revisit a selected amount of high schools from last year.

4th Quarter

Evaluate the number of Indiana applicants and number of newly created caddie programs

throughout the plan.

Long-Term

The long-term goal for this project is to inform potential candidates in Southern Indiana about

this invaluable opportunity and eventually transform Southern Indiana into another competitive

region for the Evans Scholarship.

Year 3

Reevaluate the effectiveness of the communication plan.

Make changes to communication plan.

Establish and plan a new communication project.

Implement newly designed plan.

Year 4

Continue implementing new communication project.

Evaluate effectiveness at the midpoint.

Make necessary changes to plan and continue implementation.

Year 5

Evaluate progress of past communication plans and decide whether to continue or to

focus efforts elsewhere.

Why Does this Even Matter?

The timelines expressed above, and the project in general, are an important asset to the Evans

Scholar Foundation for many reasons. One of the missions of the Evans Scholar Foundation is to

send deserving caddies to school. This project not only expresses how to reach them; it explains

how to effectively communicate and reach an extremely deserving audience. The timeline is

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important because it breaks the project down into an easy to follow, step-by-step, guide. The

timeline is useful to the Evans Scholars Foundation because it aids in the foundation’s goal of

sponsoring one thousand caddies all in the same year (“Who We Are”).

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Class Content

Exercise Summary

The communication project was an extremely important assignment for the class.

Creating a whole project focusing on something we care about allowed us to fully immerge

ourselves in a project that would otherwise be difficult. The project allowed me to test my own

knowledge about communication and reinforced what I already knew. It is very difficult to

understand and retain concepts without the hands-on experience of implementing them. The

project allowed me to do just that.

The project was helpful to realize how difficult and painstaking effective communication

can be. The project brought the concepts from just being words in books to being the framework

and complete focus of an operation. Understanding what audiences should be focused on and

how to decide on what medium to reach them through was only one of the important skills the

project has taught me. Analyzing how to make a persuasive and sticky message is skill that will

be beneficial in the future. The project was an excellent opportunity to create a technical plan

without getting into too much detail. The circumstances under the project allowed us to focus on

the purpose rather than getting caught up in the practicality or implementation of such a project.

Lastly, the project helped me to realize why I became a SPEA major. I now fully understand that

I care deeply about helping other people and classes like this are the tools SPEA provides me to

enable me to do just that.

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Works Cited

Works Cited

Beilman, Elizabeth. "Study: Poverty in Southern Indiana Increased by 59 Percent over 10

Years." News and Tribune. N.p., 29 Oct. 2014. Web. 09 Dec. 2014.

<http://www.newsandtribune.com/news/study-poverty-in-southern-indiana-increased-by-

percent-over-years/article_da793f32-5f09-11e4-9b8b-93ec54ad047f.html>.

Bonk, Kathy. Strategic Communications for Nonprofits: A Step-by-step Guide to Working with the

Media. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2008. Print.

Garnett, James L. "Applying a Strategic Model." Communicating for Results in Government. N.p.: n.p.,

n.d. 34-71. Print.

Jones, J. "Persuasion." Persuasion in Society. By H. Simmons. N.p.: n.p., n.d. 15-30. Print.

Simons, Herbert W. "Going Public: Delivering a Presentation That Persuades." Persuasion in Society.

N.p.: n.p., n.d. 271-317. Print.

"Who We Are." WGA-ESF. Western Golf Association, n.d. Web. 09 Dec. 2014.

<http://www.wgaesf.org/site/c.dwJTKiO0JgI8G/b.6021363/k.2457/Who_We_Are.htm>.

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