On the promise of preparedness for PR practice: Are we practising what we preach?

UK undergraduate Public Relations (PR) courses make routine statements that students will be prepared for PR and communications practice by attending. This paper considers whether such statements might be considered ‘promises’ and the responsibility that might therefore fall on educators to deliver on them. The paper then explores what it might mean to consider education for professional practice (the ‘promise’) through the lens of ‘preparedness’. How would it make us think and what insight might be achieved? Preparedness is defined as an ability to act in uncertainty and the paper situates this idea within recent conceptions of practice. Finally, the paper considers concepts from the education literature to suggest an appraisal of PR’s signature pedagogies for achieving preparedness for practice.