Speed networking helps area PR professionals meet

FPRA Volusia County Chapter Members met other members and learned something new about people they know during speed networking, March 13.

Participants sat down for one-on-one, four-minute sessions to get each other up to speed on their lives. Some of what we learned might surprise you. For instance, did you know...

• New member Lee Lopez, public information officer for the City of Deltona, comes from a broadcast media background in the Orlando market, working for UPN television.

• Cindi Brownfield, associate director of communications at Stetson University, has a son attending Daytona Beach Community College and a daughter at Atlantic High School? She worked in print journalism 20 years before joining Stetson. Her most frequent responsibility is an electronic alumni newsletter that can reach 15 pages long.

• Both Mary Anne Rogers, executive director of public relations/communications at Stetson U.; and Anastasia Shaw Bucksath, Crescent Star Rising Consultants cofounder; have a background in the entertainment industry.

• Kelly Thompson, marketing manager at Florida Hospital Imaging, has been in the health care industry for four years, but started in public relations/communications for professional sports in the northeast. She juggles promoting the area's first digital mammography service with raising three kids, including twin daughters!

Photos by Cindi Brownfield