Events & Engagement Specialist

About the role

The Rice School of Architecture seeks a highly organized, proactive, and collaborative Events & Engagement Specialist to serve as the operational cornerstone for all school events. The school prides itself in a wide array of events that produce innovative, engaging content and are executed with the highest standards of excellence.

The Events and Engagement Specialist focuses on events planning and execution, as well as engagement, participation, and analytics. They oversee the end-to-end planning, logistics, and technical execution of all public-facing events, as well as a portfolio of internal school activities.

Responsibilities

• Serves as the primary project manager for multi-faceted school events, lectures, conferences, and exhibitions
• Supports the school Events Committee by coordinating meetings, preparing and distributing agendas, recording meeting minutes, and maintaining documentation of committee work
• Plans, coordinates logistics, and facilitates school-wide, faculty, and staff meetings, seminars, workshops, and retreats
• Designs and executes registration strategies, guest accommodations, ticketing workflows, and catering needs
• Acts as the account manager for event deliverables, handles vendor contracts and catering purchases, processes event-related expenses, and collaborates cross-departmentally to manage program budgets
• Installs, sets up, operates, and monitors technical equipment for events and meetings
• Drafts, edits, and distributes regular written updates, print material, newsletters, and policy/event announcements
• Represents the School of Architecture at university-wide events and operations meetings to cultivate internal institutional relationships
• Provides direct technical guidance and A/V orientation to faculty, staff, and students using the school's presentation spaces
• Coordinates closely with faculty members, students, and staff to systematically collect, track, and serve as the centralized repository for academic and professional milestones

Requirements

• Bachelor’s Degree
• Three or more (3+) years of professional experience in event management, project coordination, or hospitality/operations

Skills

• Superior event production skills with the ability to lead a diverse team of staff, faculty, students, and vendors under tight deadlines
• Competence in setting up, operating, and troubleshooting a variety of audio, visual, and multimedia equipment
• Excellent written, verbal, and interpersonal communication skills
• Strong customer service, diplomacy, and tact
• Extreme attention to detail, strong analytical and strategic decision-making capabilities, and the capacity to balance multiple complex workflows simultaneously

Benefits

This is a full-time, benefits-eligible position. For more information on Rice University's benefits, please visit the Rice University HR | Benefits page.

Pay

The proposed hiring range is $62,000 – $65,000 annually, depending on qualifications and experience.

Schedule

This position is exclusively on-site, necessitating all duties to be performed in-person, Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., with select evenings and weekends required based on the event schedule.