BANGOR – An advanced public relations class at the New England School of Communications is providing marketing and advertising services free-of-charge to five local nonprofit organizations.

The 12 students are acting as consultants to Caring Connections, My Friend’s Place, Pathfinders, United Way and Challenged America. Two students are assigned to work with MitoAction, a mitochondrial disease awareness organization in Boston.

“This is community service learning at its best,” said Anne O’Reilly, an adjunct faculty member in the department of marketing communications at NESCOM. “These folks are going out into the real world in six months and it’s pretty critical to have hands-on experience now.”

Senior Brittany Sawyer, Kylie Carpenter and Danielle Rosenblum are majoring in marketing communications and plan to design and produce media materials, pamphlets and fliers for Caring Connections, a cooperative program of the Bangor YMCA and Eastern Maine Medical Center that offers low cost OB-GYN care for uninsured and underinsured women.

“They just need some young eyes” to refresh their marketing materials, Sawyer said of Caring Connections. The young women plan to draw on their own graphic design skills and those of their classmates, many of whom are familiar with computer programs such as Adobe Photoshop, InDesign and Illustrator.

Dan Peterson, a senior audio engineering major plans to produce public service announcements for radio and television on behalf of United Way’s 211 program, a statewide social services hot line.

Laura Mitchell, communications director at United Way, said she is thrilled to have help.

“We are just constantly in need of volunteers and expertise from students and others. This was just a great way for us to get some help and for them to get a learning experience,” Mitchell said.

Karen Kohlmeyer, owner of My Gym, a children’s fitness center in Brewer, needs help promoting Challenged America, a nonprofit division of the My Gym franchise that helps children with disabilities improve their quality of life.

“I need help finding the best places to advertise in the area,” Kohlmeyer said. “And I’m wondering should I advertise on television? Which channels are young families watching?”

At the end of the semester, the students will be graded by O’Reilly and by their nonprofits. The students will also put together a semester report, including a time log, which the class hopes will help the businesses gauge how much time and money the businesses can expect to put into marketing and advertising services in the future.