Sick buildings, sick kids: facilities construction and management take on illness prevention

University Business, July, 2005 by Rebecca Sausner

"When you're talking about health and responding to emergencies, being proactive and having emergency processes in place is crucial so you're not learning as you're going," she says.

In North Carolina, the proactive steps in the mold crisis didn't stop with a press conference. The school put forth a lobbying effort to get the state to pay for the mold cleanup.

And concerned that the negative publicity would hurt future enrollment, the communications team created a campaign they called "From Mold to Gold." It involved a 16-city tour of North Carolina, with meetings with newspaper editorial boards, alumni, businesses and prospective students in each city. The effort ended the next fall when it was noted that enrollment had increased 7.5 percent. The strategy won NCCU a Special Merit award in the public relations category from District III of the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education.

Rebecca Sausner is a freelance writer and can be reached at rdsausner@yahoo.com.