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We sat down virtually with our 2021 Foggies winners to get to know them better! This year's Rising Star of the Year went to Sarah Mattina, JetBlue Technology Ventures. Read on to learn more about Sarah!

Tell us more about yourself.

While I have a BA in Strategic Communications, my career path didn’t lead me to public relations until fairly recently. I graduated from Miami University in 2017 and joined Southwest Airlines as a curriculum developer. From there, I moved to the company’s corporate communications team with a focus on internal communications and change management.

My experience at Southwest …

We sat down virtually with our 2021 Foggies winners to get to know them better! This year's Professional of the Year went to Curtis Sparrer, and the Small Agency of the Year went to Bospar PR, which Sparrer is the principal and co-founder. Read what Curtis & Bospar had to say! 

Tell us more about yourself.

Curtis Sparrer is a principal and co-founder of Bospar PR.  

His client work spans B2B, B2C, and every permutation in between. He has delivered stellar results for such clients as PayPal, Unisys, Tetris, and the alien hunters of the SETI Institute. 

Business Insider  …

At this year’s 2021 The Foggies Award Ceremony, John McCartney, PRSA-SF Director-at-Large was awarded the chapter’s newly created PRSA San Francisco Bay Area Chapter Leadership Award. 

The Foggies Award Committee created this inaugural award to recognize an individual for exemplary contributions to the Chapter. McCartney was selected for this honor for his efforts in launching The Foggies Awards three years ago, and dedicating countless hours to serving on the PRSA-SF Chapter Board for six years. 

He even remained on the board in 2020 and 2021, despite relocating for greater professional opportunities. McCartney is the founder and agency principal of …

We are excited to announced the winners of our third annual awards program, The Foggies. We held our first hybrid awards ceremony on October 28 at 620 Jones cocktail bar, where we recognized the San Francisco Bay Area’s best public relations and communications programs and the brightest professionals who bring them to life.

The prestigious program was open to public relations and communications professionals from agencies, in-house teams, and nonprofits. The hybrid ceremony was emceed by Katina Tinka Bush, PRSA-SF director of awards. Catherine Hernandez, senior vice president and chief communications officer for Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Inc. and Kaiser …

Can you believe award season is here again? Neither can we! 

Despite it sneaking up on us too, we are excited for the 3rd Annual PRSA San Francisco Bay Area Chapter Awards Program (The Foggies)! The Foggies provide an opportunity for us all to reflect on and celebrate our successes over the past year (and it has been another one for the books, hasn’t it?!). 

We recognize the Bay Area’s best public relations programs and the brightest professionals who bring them to life. As you prepare your submissions, we wanted to share some helpful hints and answers to …

In another edition of our Meet the Board series, we are excited to introduce Catherine Brozena, APR. Catherine is serving as our Director of Accreditation in Public Relations this year. She also hosted a virtual APR open house earlier this year. Miss the event? Reach out to Catherine to find out more about your APR. In the meantime, meet Catherine here!

Tell us about yourself and your current role

I am a communications consultant with my own independent PR and communications practice that serves organizations and initiatives in the social change space. So I work almost exclusively with non-profits …

Tell us about yourself and your current role

I am a Singapore transplant in the Bay Area since 2017. My PR and marketing career spans APAC, the U.S. and Europe. Before coming to the U.S., I spent three years as Director of Corporate Affairs at Levi Strauss & Co. for Asia, Middle East, and Africa. Earlier, I was with P&G Asia for 12 years, spearheading marketing communications for SK-II and a legion of other global beauty brands. 

My current role is with Singapore Global Network, based in San Francisco, leading content marketing strategy, marketing programs and execution, and communications …

Tell us about yourself and your current role.

I work for the City of San Jose as Deputy Director of Mineta San Jose International Airport, overseeing the Airport's Communications and Marketing teams. Thank the beginning and end of "Love, Actually" -- airports are full of incredible stories, and my teams are responsible for sharing them with the world.

How did you get into PR?

I entered college wanting to become a television producer, and since I've always been most interested in nonfiction stories, I first majored in journalism. I quickly learned that journalism is truly a labor of love, and …

As part of PRSA's mission to advance the PR profession and the professional, we bring you our next Meet the Media Q+A profile. In this Q+A, we speak with Christine Hall, contributing tech writer for Crunchbase News.

Tell us the story about how you got into journalism?

I've always been interested in English and writing. I enjoyed reading books and still do. Originally I wanted to be a teacher until I got to middle school and saw how the other children acted in class and thought, "okay, there's no way I'd be able to do this." So I …

Tell us about yourself and your current role

While I started my career working in-house for a national non-profit, I have spent the last 6 years in B2B tech PR agencies. Currently I am an Account Supervisor at PAN Communications where I’ve worked my way through the ranks and even made a cross-country move in 2019 from their Boston headquarters, here to SF. In my current position I get to lead the day-to-day strategy for a variety of tech clients from start-ups to public enterprises, which spans media relations, social media, content development and even podcast production.

How did you …