Last week I attended a "Mentor Night" at Rowan University. This is a program that was started by Don Bagin 30 years ago to bring graduates of Rowan's Graduate Public Relations Program back to meet with current students. This time of year seems especially hectic for all of us, and it's not really convenient to trek over to campus on a Tuesday evening when so many other things are calling for our attention at work and at home.

But I remembered how a veteran of the program took the time to meet with me when I was a student years ago, and I knew that, once again, I had to honor this request for a few hours of my time. Once again I learned that those who give are often rewarded more than those who receive. A former student of mine who is now close to graduation had come to the reception just for the possibility that he might spend some time with me.

Ron Sansone already has a great job as an SEO Copywriter at razorfish, probably the largest online communications agency in the world. He didn't come to Mentor Night for help with finding a job in his specialty, or for advice on the rigorous "comps" that come at the end of Rowan's MA program in PR, or even to discuss his thesis. He came to thank me for the online communication class he had take in the summer of 2007 and the opportunity he was given there to write for the IAOC blog.

Ron Sansone's "Digg Dirt" articles can be found here. Basically, he researched how a few partisan Ron Paul advocates were manipulating Digg to boost their candidate's web exposure. His posts generated a huge response from the online community, and he says that experience helped him land the job at razorfish.

As the Mentor Night concluded, Ron said once again that he couldn't thank me enough for the help he had in launching his career. At which point I told him there is a way to thank everyone who made his online debut possible: he can come back and be a regular contributor or even a host on the IAOC blog. Ron committed to coming back in December, and I look forward to the contributions he will make.

So thank you Ron for taking time to come say "thanks" at least week's Mentor Night. And thank you especially for making the commitment to add your voice to this blog.

To all the others who might come across this article, is there someone you can thank by contributing your time to a community that helped you?

Don Dunnington