Photo by Gary Gold

Whether she’s talking with local officials about city revitalization efforts or listening to a neighbor about a concern, Allison Newman has her ear to the ground in the growing effort to connect Rensselaer with the surrounding community.

“I think of myself as a conduit that carries information both ways,” says Newman, the new director of community relations at Rensselaer. “I’m the person who neighbors can talk to about their ideas and concerns. I can then take this information back to the Institute, or to local officials, or to any number of resources where it can be appropriately addressed.”

Rensselaer’s Office of Government and Community Relations hired Newman last December to bolster the Institute’s community partnership program and expand local outreach efforts to effectively advance President Jackson’s vision of “communiversity,” a term to describe Rensselaer’s working relationship with Troy and the Capital Region.

To accomplish this, Newman has teamed up with myriad individuals and groups, from local and regionally elected and appointed officials, to city engineers, to community-based and nonprofit organizations that play a vital role in the community.

Working with such diverse groups is nearly second nature to Newman, whose background is in communications. She spent several years working in state government, notably in the governor’s office, holding various positions from 1986 to 1995. Most recently, she was vice president of business development at Blue Slate Solutions, a consulting firm with a nationwide client base.

Part of Newman’s job today entails working with Institute leadership to encourage and facilitate an expanded role for faculty, staff, and students in local neighborhoods. For instance, she’s collaborating with the Office of the First Year Experience to expand community-service programs as part of student orientation.

“We want to introduce students to the community in ways that will allow them to appreciate the city of Troy and Rensselaer County,” Newman says. “By introducing freshmen to the surrounding neighborhoods as part of their first-year experience, we’re hoping that they ultimately choose to live and work in the local area beyond graduation.”

Newman also chairs the newly revived Community Relations Committee, consisting of about 20 students, faculty, and representatives of various departments across campus, to better coordinate all of Rensselaer’s outreach efforts.

In other collaborations, Newman is working with the Administration Division to take President Jackson’s Neighborhood Renewal Initiative to the next level to include overall city planning, economic development, better student housing, and a higher quality of life for all residents.

In addition, she has developed a comprehensive public-information plan to keep the campus and local community apprised of the Institute’s ongoing construction and development projects. The plan includes monthly public meetings, a newly created Web site and a monthly print publication distributed to students, residents, and local businesses.

“My job is about building relationships and nurturing those relationships for everybody’s best interest,” Newman says.