More directly, a New York Times staff editorial blasted the University's Rowe denied in an interview yesterday that thenew post was a reaction to the unusual volume ofnews this year, or the criticism the Universityhas drawn for its public affairs operation. On the contrary, Rowe said, the communicationsdirector was an idea he had discussed withRudenstine as early as his interview for the vicepresidency last April. "I would flatly deny that it has anything to dowith anything that happened this year." Rowe saidof the new post, adding that he has the highestregard for the current news staff. "It's a situation regarding [workload] ratherthan personnel," Rowe added. "I think that we getmore inquiries than any other University in thecountry, and there is no normal week at Harvard." Wrinn agreed. "That component of this job [fieldinginquiries] takes up the majority of my time, evenbefore you start talking about communications andaffirmative interaction with the press," he said. Still, the new communications director will adda third layer to the Harvard media team, one thatisn't present even at other schools of similarstature. For example, MIT has a director of publicrelations services and a director of its newsoffice, but nothing analogous to a vice presidentof communication, according to Robert C. Dilorio,associate director of the MIT news office. And Yale University's communications affairsare handled largely by Gary G. Fryer, whose titleis director of public affairs and specialassistant to the president, according to TomConroy, who is assistant director of the office ofpublic affairs. The job description requires candidates to havea "minimum of 15 years of communications/publicaffairs experience preferable in a complex anddecentralized environment requiring skill in bothjournalism and advocacy." Rowe said he hopes to have the newcommunications director in place by the beginningof the next academic year. Jonathan N. Axelrod contributed to thereporting of this story.
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