Senior Writer and Director of Communications

Position Summary

The Senior Writer & Director of Communications is a strategic, creative, and highly skilled communications leader responsible for shaping and amplifying the voice, narrative, and public presence of the Ballmer Institute for Children’s Behavioral Health. This role oversees content strategy and brand messaging and ensures clear, compelling, and mission-aligned storytelling across internal and external audiences.

The Director serves as the chief communications partner to the Executive Director and senior leadership team—crafting speeches, remarks, statements, reports, proposals, and editorial pieces—and manages the institute’s overall communications strategy, editorial planning, media engagement, and digital presence.

The role blends high-level strategic thinking with hands-on writing excellence to advance the institute’s mission, partnerships, and national visibility. The Director oversees a growing communications team and provides leadership in setting vision, strategy, and priorities for the team. The Director also provides coaching, guidance, and performance management, while allocating resources and building team capacity to support the institute’s strategic goals.

Minimum Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in journalism, communications, English, public relations, marketing, or a related field; or an equivalent combination of skills and experience.
• Five years of professional writing experience, with responsibility for producing high-quality written content for diverse audiences.
• Three years of experience supervising staff and/or students.
• Experience developing and implementing strategic communications plans.

Preferred Qualifications

• Master’s degree in Communications, Public Relations, Marketing, or related field.
• Experience in higher education communications and/or a large, complex organization.
• Expertise in media relations and brand journalism.
• Experience managing content strategy and multichannel storytelling initiatives.
• Proven record of innovation and metrics-based decision making.

Department Summary

The Ballmer Institute for Children's Behavioral Health at the University of Oregon Portland establishes a new national model for behavioral healthcare for children and families by creating a first-of-its-kind undergraduate training program in child behavioral health. The institute prioritizes the needs of youth who have been historically or persistently underserved and seeks to make real system change by:

• Creating a new mental health profession
• Delivering support in schools and the community
• Training existing youth-serving professionals
• Developing new approaches to support child behavioral health
• Transforming the Pacific Northwest into a national model of thought and action.