Communications Office Will Shuffle Top Spokespeople After Departure

Kevin Galvin, senior communications director for Harvard Public Affairs and Communications who has worked closely with University President Drew G. Faust, will leave the University this summer to assume a vice presidential position at Arizona State University, according to a release last week from ASU.

Galvin arrived at HPAC in 2008 after working as the deputy national editor at the Boston Globe. Prior to the Globe, Galvin worked at the Associated Press in a number of roles, including White House correspondent. At ASU, he will serve as vice president for media relations and strategic communications.

Galvin became the primary spokesperson for Faust in the summer of 2012. Since then, he has sat in on most of the president’s media obligations, including those with The Crimson. Galvin has also worked to coordinate the media work of leadership at Harvard Management Company, Provost Alan M. Garber ’76, and other officials in the University’s central administration.

“It has been an honor to work with President Faust and I hope that I have been of some service to Harvard,” Galvin wrote in a statement last week. “I grew up in Greater Boston and have long admired the University as a place where big ideas are generated and challenged, and faculty and students strive to shape the future. The chance to play a role at the institution has been the experience of a lifetime.”

Paul Andrew, acting vice president for communications, wrote on Monday that Jeff Neal, who currently oversees the media plan for the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and its dean, Michael D. Smith, will leave that role and begin working with Faust and Garber after Galvin departs. The rest of Galvin’s portfolio, including his work with HMC, has not yet been reassigned.

“Kevin has played a pivotal role in strengthening our media relations efforts, and we thank him for his service and wish him well in his new role,” Andrew wrote in a statement.

Of Neal, Andrew wrote, “Jeff is an exceptionally skilled communications professional who has managed a wide range of issues at Harvard.  He has shown an ability to convey news of institutional priorities and the remarkable work of Harvard faculty to audiences within our community and beyond.”

—Staff writer Matthew Q. Clarida can be reached at matthew.clarida@thecrimson.com Follow him on Twitter @MattClarida.