Jason Kane

"Professor Barr came into the first class in September and immediately captured my attention. His lessons applied directly to my career and they made me a better writer in one day. Over the course of the Strategic Writing class I refined my writing skills, worked on altering tone and perception of electronic communications, and put writing in the workplace into a new focus.
Because of this class, I chose to take Marketing for Non-Profits with Professor Barr and again the class gave me skills that I use everyday as a fundraiser. He gave us the opportunity to work as consultants with Inspire Now to create a social marketing strategy and campaign.
I highly recommend Professor Barr to any student that wants to become a better writer, learn not for profit marketing strategy, or master communication skills in multiple mediums that allow for career growth." Jason Kane, Tepper School, CMU

Vidhyu Rao

“Professor Ed Barr is one of our most sought after external instructors for Cognizant Academy. As the head of Academy, I wanted to make sure we bring world class training programs and faculty to our associates and Ed Barr is one such world class member we have been able to tap into for our “Business Writing” course. Ed has delivered this course for the past four years for us, and the course has evolved into a program that suits our current business needs. Ed is a true partner who understands our dynamic business environment and diverse culture has customized and delivered the program in a true blended learning approach.” Vidhyu Rao, Cognizant

Pittsburgh Community Re-investment Group

Everyone at PCRG would like to say THANK YOU to Ed Barr for his excellent presentation on Non-Profit Marketing. Everyone in attendance got to benefit from a discussion on what marketing is REALLY about and how each of us can utilize some new strategies in our organizations. We hope this is the first of many more presentations on our brand and reaching our customer (community). Once again, thank you Professor Ed Barr.

Sanjeev Vellore Ramani

I had taken up your Professional Writing class in Summer ’09. I am from the MSIT department. I decided to take up Professional Writing even though it was not a “core course” requirement for my graduation (I am supervised by “The School of Computer Science” and “Software Engineering Institute”). A couple of seniors suggested that it would be a great value addition and I can confidently say that it was my letter to the director of recruiting that brought my resume to his notice. The company receives ten thousand resumes per day on an average. I had personally given five hard copies of my resume to different representatives but nothing clicked. Finally, I decided to mail the director of recruiting and I tried including all the “good points” of writing that you had discussed in class – (Writing in first person, crisp sentences ( I could not always follow this though !), using bullets, using a verb as the subject etc). I Thank You for making a “positive impact” on my writing abilities.