James Niedzinski
Equinox Staff
Kathryn Dodge has recently started her new part-time position at Keene State College. Dodge’s new position is as Helen Giles-Gee’s special assistant. Dodge is the third assistant in the administrative arsenal.
In addition to Dodge, Ann Gagnon acts as the president’s executive assistant, and Amy Proctor is the senior administrative assistant to the president.
“I’m doing support work for the president, that is priority number one,” Dodge said.
Her first day at this position was Sept. 23.
One of Dodge’s main duties is to schedule cabinet meetings and provide relations to the college at the federal level, working closely with Keene’s local government.
“I attend committees to take a look on how they fit in on the vision of the college, to see what is working [and] what’s not. To really make sure the president is aware of the variety of committees and the management of committees on campus,” Dodge said.
The position that Dodge holds now used to be a full-time position; however, it was cut to a part-time position due to budget restraints.
For the past decade, Dodge was the executive director at the post secondary education commission, a state agency that regulates all higher education in N.H. During her time she worked closely with Giles-Gee.
From 1987 to 2001, Dodge was the director of admissions at KSC.
“We have specific areas that we each cover, sometimes we overlap. We really operate as a team; all four of us need to communicate daily on what the issues are. What a lot of people don’t realize is that most people don’t know where to go to get a question answered they come to us. We are the first contact point with the college to the community,” Gagnon said.
In addition an important communication aspect of the administration, tending to the needs of board of trustees who visited this week, is a major part of the job.
All special events with the city, events with donors, and awards ceremonies are also handled by Dodge.
In addition to her current work at Keene, Dodge works with the Council Higher Education, and the American University of Madaba in the country of Jordan. The American University of Madaba is responsible for establishing higher education on an international level.
“At the end of the day, we don’t necessarily always have a lot of paper produced, but we have a lot of interactions that have taken place,” Dodge said.
“It’s a tough job, because you can’t really say what you’re going to get done every day,” Gagnon added.
James Niedzinski can be contacted at jniedzinski@ksc.mailcruiser.com.