Agency 398 puts the real world on the syllabus

A fire department’s fundraising gala is an unusually concrete assignment for a college class. There is an event to publicize, a room to fill and equipment to help pay for. In 2015, the Los Angeles Fire Department Foundation hired Agency 398 to help promote its Fahrenheit Gala. The agency was being built by public relations students at California State University, Northridge. Some of the people learning to pitch the story were also learning how to run the place.

That early assignment gives Agency 398 a useful point of entry. A student needs experience before an employer will trust them with a client. A community organization needs communications help to bring people into its work. Put those needs together and a classroom can become a small agency, with obligations extending beyond the final grade.

A course number with clients attached

Agency 398 began in 2015 as a revamp of CSUN’s public relations practicum. The earlier class had concentrated on social media support for campus clubs. The new arrangement brought outside clients into the work. Media relations coordinator Teja Foster explained the intention simply: “We’re trying to give a hands on experience.”

The interesting change was who would be on the receiving end. An outside client brings its own priorities and its own definition of useful work. A student can no longer assume that completing the assignment settles the matter. Someone has to be able to use it.

The work starts before the post

Today, the agency’s work sits inside a journalism curriculum. JOUR 398C requires students to have passed introductory public relations and PR writing, with JOUR 398B taken alongside it. The course specifies work for nonprofit clients, including social media, events and media materials. The preparation matters: knowing how to publish something is only one part of knowing whether it should be published.

For an organization, the service menu offers several ways in. A fundraiser might need event promotion. A community program might need a clearer website. A team with something to announce might need a press release, a media list and a reason for a journalist to open the email. Agency 398 advertises support across those areas, alongside brand development and community engagement.

Those are connected jobs. A social post can bring someone to an event; the event can introduce them to a program; a follow-up story can give the program a longer life. The practical question is which part of that sequence needs help. Buying “awareness” is a vague instruction. Asking a team to explain an event to a particular audience gives the work a shape.

A client list with a neighborhood in it

Agency 398’s published roster includes My Friend’s Place, LA Family Housing, StrengthUnited and the Mike Curb College of Arts, Media and Communication. It also lists organizations concerned with education, animals and community services. This is work close to the institutions through which a city looks after people, teaches them and helps them participate.

A CSUN departmental memo from October 2023 makes the mix more specific: that year’s clients included The SoCal Sound, the university’s Autonomy Research Center for STEAHM, StrengthUnited and the Mike Curb College. A radio station, a research center and a support organization cannot all be explained in the same language. The variety makes audience judgment part of the assignment.

That is where this agency fits in the market. It offers communications capacity through an educational institution, with students doing the work and faculty guiding it. A nonprofit considering that arrangement is choosing a working relationship as well as a set of deliverables. The opportunity is especially clear when a project can be defined, reviewed and completed within an agreed period.

Free help still needs a good brief

CSUN described Agency 398’s nonprofit work as pro bono in a 2020 profile of student Gabbie Puzon. The same account credited her with leading a project team and organizing peers around client goals. Service and education occupied the same assignment: the organization received help, while students practiced responsibility for work shared with others.

For a prospective client, the sensible first move is a conversation about the project. Explain the audience, the deadline, the available materials and the person who can approve the work. Ask which expenses, if any, belong to the organization. A waived professional fee and an event with no expenses are different propositions.

This model also asks for time. Someone must answer questions and correct misunderstandings before they become finished assets. An organization with no available contact person should address that problem before commissioning a campaign. Likewise, a need for continuous emergency coverage deserves an explicit discussion about staffing and availability. A student practicum works best when its responsibilities are clear to everyone.

A useful assignment gives the student something to learn and the client something to use.

The exchange at the center of the agency

The audience gets an invitation

In spring 2026, the work appeared on the campus calendar. Agency 398 was listed as organizer of the April 22 Radiate You! activation, with a program of performance, an open mic, line dancing and opportunities to participate in event content. The listing offered several ways for students to join in, rather than asking them simply to watch.

The May 7 premiere of Radiate: Black Excellence Unveiled listed Agency 398 and Black Scholars Matter as organizers. Its seven-episode documentary series explored Black Scholars Matter students’ experiences of support, belonging and college life. The screening included a student panel and was listed as free to attend.

These are modest, tangible examples of communications taking physical form. There is a venue, a reason to gather and a chance for people to speak. For a campus program, that can be a more meaningful brief than a request to post more often. The medium is partly the room itself.

After the syllabus, the unpredictable day

The agency’s alumni interviews offer another way to understand the education around it. In one, 2019 CSUN graduate Bridget Fornaro described a move from Carol Marshall Public Relations to Porter Novelli, where her work involved healthcare accounts. The challenge she identified was translation: making scientific language understandable and figuring out what different teams needed.

Asked for one word to describe a typical day, she chose “Unpredictable.” It is a useful corrective to the idea that PR is mostly a matter of producing polished sentences. People need clarification. Teams need coordination. A message that feels obvious to its author may need another explanation.

Jennifer Kelleher, a 2018 graduate featured in another interview, described starting out interested in broadcast journalism before discovering that she preferred representing clients. Her account places internships and coursework together in that discovery. Experience helped her work out which side of the conversation she wanted to occupy.

For someone building a student program, the lesson to borrow is specific: give students a piece of work that another person actually needs, with preparation and guidance around it. For a nonprofit, bring an assignment narrow enough to finish and important enough to matter. The real world becomes a better teacher when everyone knows what is due.