Current PR students and recent college grads: are you stressed about turning your great internships into a full-time entry-level gig? Do you embody the phrase “shameless self-promotion”? Are you an expert in all things social media? (Come on, you know you are.) If you answered “yes” to any of those three questions, then you may be an ideal candidate for Affect PR‘s “New York Job Project“–a program designed to simultaneously encourage talented applicants and promote the firm itself by “crowdsourcing” the hiring process.

This all started more than two years ago when Affect, a small-ish Manhattan firm, started the “New York Intern Project” because, according to president and founder Sandra Fathi, they were “having trouble attracting interns in one of the country’s most competitive markets.”

Applicants’ resumes often boasted of college gigs with brands like MTV, Def Jam and Glamour, but Affect wanted to find dedicated public relations professionals. Affect’s b2b (that’s “business to business”) services are crucial to the industry at large, but they’re also not quite as flashy as those big names–so Fathi created the intern project in order to “make [the internship] more attractive to people around the country.”

A quick look at 2011′s entries will tell you that the project worked better than expected.

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Yes, it’s true: Hurricane Sandy turned this week upside down. In the midst of all the bad news about millions going without power, $50 billion dollars in damage, and bad behavior in the wake of the storm, it’s encouraging to read about some positive developments. We’re not sure when the New York/New Jersey area will return to normal, but in the meantime some particularly inventive PR professionals are trying to help out.

Affect is a firm located right smack in the middle of Manhattan, where the effects of this week’s storm have been particularly dramatic. Noticing that many of her friends, clients and employees have been affected, Affect owner and president Sandra Fathi set up a Facebook page called “PR Helping PR” yesterday with the stated goal of helping as many affected professionals as possible return to work–even if their offices aren’t yet up and running.

The site plans to achieve this goal by bringing PR pros who need office space together with those who have space to share. Affect encourages both stranded employees and any PR companies located in areas suffering from storm damage to post status updates in the interest of helping at least a few dedicated professionals find an available desk at which to do their work.

Your editors have been fortunate enough to work from home this week, but many in the industry aren’t so lucky. If you’re one of those stuck without a working computer/Internet connection, or if you have resources to offer, please check out the PR Helping PR page.

Welcome to the first of PRNewser’s four-part “Career Development Series.” Over the next four Wednesdays, we’ll be exploring some of the career development issues that PRs at different levels in their careers are faced with.

This week, we’re starting at the start: how to turn that internship into a full-time job. We talked with firm execs and a former intern who actually made the leap to learn the best ways to make this happen. What we found out is that interns have a responsibility to the firms they’re interning with, and PR agencies have a responsibility to their interns, a point that sometimes gets overlooked.

Click through for more.

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PR firm Affect is holding its second annual contest to find its next PR and social media summer intern. That person will receive $5,000 along with a $2,500 housing stipend to live in New York City. Last year’s contest, which produced Affect employee Patrick Gotham, received more than 100 entries and 14,000 votes. Applicants submit a video or photo entry here explaining why they should be awarded a paid internship at Affect in New York City that will jump-start their career.

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Affect Strategies has opened The New York Intern Project for entries. Prospects should go to the Project’s website and explain why they would make a great intern with both a written essay and a photo or video by April 8. The selected intern will get a three-month position in New York, a $5,000 housing stipend, and $5,000 spending money. Wethinks that should fall within the PRSA guidelines.

Four judges will help with the decision: Guy Kawasaki, Alltop and Garage Technology Ventures founder; Mashable’s Erica Swallow;  Sandra Fathi, Affect’s founder and president; and Leslie Campisi, VP and partner for the agency.

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The PRSA held their New York chapter Big Apple Awards dinner last week at the Rainbow Room to give out 37 prizes in various categories, 18 honorable mentions. The annual John W. Hill (for leadership and public service, named for the Hill & Knowlton founder), the Philip Dorf (for mentorship) and the President’s Award (for service to the Chapter) were also given.

PainePR took the top prize for their work on the Iams Home 4 the Holidays campaign launched to place a million pets in good homes. Desperate Housewives star Felicity Huffman fronted the effort which actually placed over 1.2 million animals. The agency is a 75 person shop with offices in New York, L.A., and Orange County.

The full list of Big Apple winners can be found after the jump:

The PRSA held their New York chapter Big Apple Awards dinner last week at the Rainbow Room to give out 37 prizes in various categories, 18 honorable mentions. The annual John W. Hill (for leadership and public service, named for the Hill & Knowlton founder), the Philip Dorf (for mentorship) and the President’s Award (for service to the Chapter) were also given.

PainePR took the top prize for their work on the Iams Home 4 the Holidays campaign launched to place a million pets in good homes. Desperate Housewives star Felicity Huffman fronted the effort which actually placed over 1.2 million animals. The agency is a 75 person shop with offices in New York, L.A., and Orange County.

The full list of Big Apple winners can be found after the jump:

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