University of Maryland, Vice President for Marketing & Communications

The University of Maryland announced that Anne Buckley, APR, has been named Vice President for Marketing and Communications. In this role, Buckley will provide vision and leadership to bolster Maryland's reputation as a top national and global university in research, academics, arts, and athletics, with a commitment to embracing the diversity of its community.

Buckley brings decades of higher education experience to build upon the university’s creative foundation and strong brand, and she will guide the Office of Marketing and Communications in expanding the university's reputation for cultivating fearless leaders dedicated to the public good.

As vice president, Buckley will lead the university's 50-person Office of Marketing and Communications, which includes communications, marketing, editorial strategies, creative design, and web services. She will work closely with senior leadership across UMD to develop and deploy a communications and marketing enterprise that serves the needs of the university while supporting the colleges, schools, programs, and units.

Buckley joins UMD from the University of California San Diego, where she currently serves as the university's inaugural chief communications and marketing officer. In this role, she has worked to unite reputation, brand, and messaging priorities across the university, the academic health sciences schools, the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, the UC San Diego Health System, the NCAA Division I athletics programs, advancement, and enrollment management. Buckley also launched UC San Diego’s first strategic communications plan to drive awareness of the prestige and distinction of the brand.

Previously, Buckley served as the inaugural chief communications officer for the University of Alabama at Birmingham where she directed a staff of approximately 80 professionals in all strategic public relations activities, with an emphasis on crisis communications and issues management; internal and executive communications; and oversight of WBHM public radio. Previously, she served as the senior director in the Office of Public Affairs at Virginia Commonwealth University and held positions as a reporter and national news editor for the Associated Press.

Jack Gorman and Elizabeth Neustaedter led this search with Christina Garrison and Sandeep Kaur.