General Information

Position Title: Associate Director of Public Affairs
Control Number: 002308
Reports To: 001031
Department Name: Communications
Location: Communications
Date Prepared: Apr-09
Exempt: Yes

Primary Purpose

Administration of news and publicity programs of Middlebury College.

Responsibilities

Works cooperatively with others and accepts direction from supervisors.

* Develops newsworthy information about Middlebury's programs, events, and people for presentation to local, regional, and national media.

* Creates and manages activities to promote and publicize the arts at Middlebury.

* Provides factual and background information for use in the Director's role as institutional spokesperson and for use by the Director when cultivating national news media contacts.

* Maintains media contact lists, providing an electronic database of  key writers and editors in the print and electronic news media.

* Coordinates faculty interaction with the media.

* Manages publicity programs and promotional activities for campus events, faculty scholarly activities and accomplishment, and student achievements.

* Conducts special projects assigned by the Director of Public Affairs to support institutional marketing efforts.

* Supplies summaries of College coverage in the news to appropriate development, alumni, and publications staff for distribution to appropriate prospects, for use in Middlebury Magazine, and for placement on the Web.

* Completes special writing assignments and other projects that support the Public Affairs office in its role of supporting institutional events, such as providing biographical copy on honorary degree recipients for the commencement program, and covering on-campus alumni events (reunion alumni service award citations and homecoming alumni achievement award citations).

* Performs other related duties as required

Education & Training

Bachelor of Arts in English, journalism, communications, or related field.

Experience

3-5 years in public relations, journalism, communications, or related field.

Knowledge

Journalistic and writing skills required. Ability to identify possible news and feature ideas that will be of interest to the news media; ability to gather information needed to support the presentation of news and feature story ideas to appropriate journalists. Ability to prepare publicity materials in appropriate newspaper, magazine, or broadcast format for use by media outlets; ability to write news features in clear journalistic style for distribution to appropriate media outlets; ability to write copy for advertising and promotional vehicles and to compose "pitch" letters to media representatives.

Other

Superior written and oral communications skills. Familiarity with how journalists work and what constitutes news.

Computer proficiency: database and on-line services used in media relations activities, e.g., AScribe and the Web.