Public Relations and Communications Strategist (Open until Filled)

Job Title: Public Relations and Ckommunications Strategist

Reports To: Superintendent or designee

Work Schedule: 8.0 hours per day- 260 days per year 

Salary: Administrator Salary Schedule – Assistant Director

-https://www.msd25.org/o/District/page/employee-groups

Applications will be reviewed starting April 24th. Job listing will remain open until position has been filled.

Account code: TBA

About Marysville School District:

Marysville School District is committed to providing quality education to all students, fostering a supportive and inclusive learning environment. We serve a diverse community and strive to inform families and the public about our schools' achievements, events, and initiatives.

Job Summary:

The Marysville School District is seeking a visionary Public Relations Strategist to lead the district's long-term efforts to reshape and elevate its public image. This role is focused on strategic positioning, trust-building, and message alignment with district goals—especially around fiscal recovery, academic excellence, and community engagement. The ideal candidate brings a high-level understanding of reputation management, public trust, stakeholder perception, and the strategic use of narrative to advance institutional change. This is a strategic leadership position for someone who understands public perception as an asset, sees storytelling as a tool for reform, and can build credibility with communities that are counting on meaningful, transparent change.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

Public Image Leadership & Reputation Repositioning

• Lead a multi-year public relations strategy designed to restore and strengthen the district’s reputation with families, staff, voters, and the broader community.
• Develop a cohesive narrative arc for the district—framing its vision, values, priorities, and progress in a way that builds trust and engagement.
• Ensure all public-facing messaging reflects a forward-thinking, student-centered, and fiscally responsible district identity.

Strategic Alignment & Narrative Architecture

• Collaborate with the Superintendent and Cabinet to ensure that public relations, narrative, and two-way communication methods are aligned with board goals, strategic plans, and community values.
• Lead the development of key messages and positioning statements to anchor the district’s public identity over the arc of a school year.
• Resonsible for consistent framing of critical initiatives such as budget priorities, levies and bonds, academic improvement plans, and equity work.

Stakeholder Perception & Influence Strategy

• Design targeted, multi-year strategies to build confidence and credibility among families, voters, staff, civic leaders, business partners, and tribal/community organizations.
• Conduct perception mapping and community listening efforts to inform narrative development and identify key influencers.
• Provide a strategic framework/communication model that supports issue framing that results in a relations/reputation improvement strategy with measurable outcomes. 

 Media & Public Visibility Strategy

• Design proactive efforts to position the district in a positive light through earned media, press engagement, and strategic storytelling.
• Develop an annual media engagement calendar aligned with district milestones, highlighting student success, innovation, and fiscal responsibility.
• Build strong relationships with regional media outlets and position the Superintendent and district leadership as trusted public voices that include a plan for recurring success criteria and methods of substantiating change. 

Trust Recovery Through Strategic Campaigning

• Develop a public confidence-building plan around major trust-building efforts, including levy and bond campaigns, fiscal transparency, and district performance metrics.
• Partner with internal and external stakeholders to co-create campaign strategies that educate and engage the public.
• Use data-driven insights to guide campaign timing, message testing, and targeted outreach.

 External Relations & Community Partnerships

• Cultivate long-term partnerships plans with local governments, civic leaders, The Tulalip Tribes, and community organizations to advance the district’s reputation and strategic priorities and meaningful partnership that results in improved outcomes for students.
• Design public affairs strategies and metrics that align the district’s goals with broader community priorities.

Qualifications

Education and Experience: 

• Bachelor’s degree in Public Relations, Strategic Communications, Public Affairs, or a related field and 3 years of experience in public relations strategy including a proven track record in reputation strategy, stakeholder engagement, and public trust-building, preferably with leadership or advisory roles in institutional or public-sector settings or equivalen combination of education, training and experience.
• Successful Washington State Patrol and Federal Bureau of Investigation Fingerprint Clearance.
• I-9 Employment Eligibility in compliance with the Immigrations Reform and Control Act.

     The following experience is preferred:

• Experience leading public perception of brand repositioning initiatives in a complex organization.
• Familiarity with educational systems, community engagement, or civic/government affairs.
• Experience with trust-sensitive campaigns, including levy/bond or public finance efforts.
• Bilingual capabilities or cultural competency with diverse communities.

Demonstrated Effective Key Competencies: 

• Strategic framing and messaging development.
• Long-term planning and campaign architecture.
• Stakeholder mapping and influence building.
• Public trust and confidence recovery.
• Thought leadership and executive advisement.
• Media positioning and narrative control.
• Relationship development with external influencers.
• Sound judgment in high-visibility or sensitive situations.

Working Conditions:

The work environment characteristics described are representative of those an employee encounters while performing the essential functions of this job. Work environment will include an office and multiple district buildings.  The employee may be confined to a work area; required to have precise control of fingers and hand movements; experience constant interruptions and inflexible deadlines; must be able to work at a computer monitor for prolonged periods and must be able to stoop, crouch, crawl, bend, kneel, and stand for periods of time. The employee will need to respond at all hours to emergent situations and is required to deal with distraught and/or angry persons and is exposed to infectious diseases carried by children. The noise level in the work environment is acceptable to this particular environment and can vary depending upon daily activity but will remain within acceptable ranges. May require evening or weekend work to address emergencies or attend meetings. 

Evaluation:

This position shall be evaluated periodically by the Superintendent or designee pursuant to the currently established district procedures and evaluation criteria.  The process shall include an evaluation of the employee’s performance of the above essential job functions.  

EQUAL OPPORTUNITY EMPLOYER (EOE)

Marysville School District complies with all federal and Washington State rules and regulations and will provide equal employment opportunity and treatment for all applicants and staff in recruitment, hiring, retention, assignment, transfer, promo, and training. Such equal employment opportunity will be provided without discrimination with respect to race, creed, national origin, age, honorably discharged veteran or military status, sex, sexual orientation including gender expression or identity, marital status, the presence of any sensory, mental or physical disability or the use of a trained dog guide or service animal by a person with a disability. The district will provide equal access to school facilities to the Boy Scouts of America and all other designated youth groups listed in Title 36 of the United States Code as a patriotic society. 

NON-DISCRIMINATION STATEMENT

 Job Description developed April 2025

Salary : $138,084 - $155,327