(Posted August 3, 2009)

HUNTINGDON, Pa. -- Gabriel Welsch, assistant vice president of marketing at Juniata College since 2007, has been promoted to vice president for advancement and marketing, effective immediately.

"Gabe has shown in a relatively short time here that he has a firm grasp on how to create a cohesive marketing strategy and integrate that same strategy into our fund-raising efforts and alumni programs," says Thomas R. Kepple, president of Juniata.

"Gabe has shown in a relatively short time here that he has a firm grasp on how to create a cohesive marketing strategy and integrate that same strategy into our fund-raising efforts and alumni programs."

Thomas R. Kepple, president of Juniata.

Welsch will continue to oversee Juniata's marketing efforts, including print publications, media relations, digital media and the college's print shop. In addition he will supervise the alumni relations office, the college's development department and the office of corporate and foundation support.

Welsch came to Juniata in June 2007 from Penn State's College of the Liberal Arts, where he was assistant to the dean for advancement and manager of publications and public relations at from 2005 to 2007.

During his tenure at Juniata, Welsch implemented a redesign of the college's alumni magazine, helped conceive the college's fund-raising theme, "Changing Lives to Change the World," and oversaw the college's new efforts in social media such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

Welsch earned two degrees from Penn State: a bachelor's degree in English in 1993, and a master of fine arts degree in English in 1998.

Before coming to Juniata, Welsch had spent his entire career at Penn State. In 1998, Welsch was hired as assistant director of communications in the College of the Liberal Arts, where he edited Liberal Arts magazine and supervised print and electronic media. In 2001, he became associate director of the Master of Fine Arts Program in the Department of English, a post he held for three years.

In addition to his administrative career, Welsch has established himself as a poet and novelist, receiving a variety of awards and recognition in both art forms. He has received Kent State University's Hart Crane Memorial Poetry Award in 1999 and was nominated for the Pushcart Prize in 2002, 2005 and 2007. He received a Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Fellowship for fiction in 2003 and was a finalist for the 2003 Iowa Prize for Short Fiction. He has published the book "Dirt and All Its Dense Labor: Poems" and has published poems and fiction in scores of journals.
He is a member of the Association of Writers and Writing Programs and the Emerging Writers Network.



Contact April Feagley at feaglea@juniata.edu or (814) 641-3131 for more information.