Ithaca College appoints new dean of the Park School of Communications

ITHACA, N.Y. — Ithaca College has named Amy Falkner the new dean of the Roy H. Park School of Communications.

Falkner has been serving as an instructor and leader in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, including serving as acting and interim dean for two years — from 2018-2020.

She joined the Newhouse faculty in 1998, was named associate dean for academic affairs in 2006, and has been senior associate dean since 2012.

Falkner will assume the duties currently held by Park School interim dean Jack Powers, who also serves as a professor of television and radio at Ithaca College.

In announcing Falkner’s appointment, Melanie Stein, provost and senior VP for academic affairs at Ithaca College, called Falkner a leader who is interested in bringing people together around a shared vision to achieve positive results.

“From her early career in newspapers, through her years teaching in the classroom and conducting and presenting research, to serving for the past decade-and-a-half in academic leadership roles within a comprehensive communications education program, Amy has demonstrated the understanding and expertise that we have been seeking in our next Park School dean,” Stein said. “Her experiences and qualities will serve our current and future Park School students well in preparing them for the ongoing transformation to the realm of digital media.”

Falkner holds a bachelor’s degree in communications/journalism from St. John Fisher College and master’s degree in magazine journalism from Syracuse University. She worked in the newspaper industry for a decade. She then entered academia as an assistant professor in the advertising department at Newhouse.