Promoting a Student Organization Event

To maximize attendance at your event you can take advantage of promotional opportunities available through the law school and the School of International Affairs by following these guidelines:

• For best results promote your event as far in advance as possible by sending a “save the date” email to faculty and students.  This is also the time to get the event posted on the law school events calendar.
• Partner up with affiliated organizations that will help promote your event to their members as well.
• Ask professors to mention the event in relevant classes.
• Consider the environment.  The law school has invested in digital signs throughout the Katz Building to reduce the need for posters. Use the following guidelines to create the slides promoting your event.
• In some cases you may find a compelling reason to create flyers for the law school or facilities outside of the law school. The law school will print six color copies of the flyer for your distribution if you send the artwork to communications@pennstatelaw.psu.edu within two business days of your needed delivery date.
• Reminder email.  A week or several days before the event, you may want to send a reminder email to faculty and students.  Important:  If this is a co-sponsored event, please be certain that only one group is sending the email to law school group email lists
• If you plan to refer to the law school in your promotional materials, please refer to the Penn State's visual identity standards. 
• The law school's communications office can provide you with the Penn State Law mark (logo). Please email requests to communications@pennstatelaw.psu.edu.
• If you plan to use the Penn State Law mark on promotional merchandise (shirts, hats, etc.) it is necessary to use University licensed vendors. 

Digital Sign Guidelines

Step 1:  When you reserve a room check “yes” in the box that says “should this event be promoted via digital signs.” The event will be placed in the upcoming event section of the signs.

Step 2:  Create a PowerPoint slide(s) and send to communications@pennstatelaw.psu.edu.  The slides will run from the date posted until the event date.

• All slides will be set to appear for 12 seconds.
• Individual events or programs should only have one sign.
• Design the slide in landscape format. 
• Fonts: Use large fonts, larger than you think you will need. We recommend A MINIMUM of 32 pt. — 40 pt. is better. You can find approved Penn State PowerPoint fonts on the University's visual identity standards. 
• Three to six lines of text per slide. More than that amount of text is hard to read, and people lose interest. 
• Do not use all caps, except for an occasional word or two. A lot of text in all caps is very difficult to read quickly. 
• For maximum legibility, light text on a dark background works best. 
• KEEP IN MIND: People will only view slides for brief period of time. They probably won't stop and pull up a chair in order to enjoy your presentation. 
• No audio will be accepted. 
• High contrast between the background and any text or images is critical for ease of viewing, however, please avoid extremely bright or neon colors. Please avoid designs with the following combinations of colors in direct contact with one another (such as text and background) to accommodate those with red-green colorblindness: (1) red and black and (2) green and black. As well, if you use red and green on the same slide, be sure they are distinctly different shades (e.g. dark red and light green). 
• All slides are reviewed by the Communications Office. We can’t publish slides if they contain: copyright violations, profane or derogatory language, sexually explicit material, or other inappropriate content.