Director of Community Engagement, Ready To Learn

Director of Community Engagement, Ready To Learn Who We Are: As an essential community institution, we magnify and deepen understanding of our community to help St. Louis flourish. We believe St. Louis is strongest when we work together toward a shared vision. By rallying around a common purpose, we move beyond barriers that have previously [...]

---

Creator

kate6midgett

Encoded

Director of Community Engagement, Ready To Learn

Who We Are: As an essential community institution, we magnify and deepen understanding of our community to help St. Louis flourish. We believe St. Louis is strongest when we work together toward a shared vision. By rallying around a common purpose, we move beyond barriers that have previously hindered our progress and take collective action toward meaningful, lasting impact.

Our History: We are a community-licensed public media organization with more than 70 years of service to the St. Louis region. For generations, Nine PBS has been a trusted and enduring presence by connecting people through educational programming, meaningful storytelling, and shared experiences that reflect the needs and aspirations of our community.

Our Values: Everything we do is rooted in our four core values: Community, Trust, Equity, and Learning. These values shape how we care for one another as teammates and how we engage with our community. We believe meaningful impact begins with listening, understanding, and creating spaces where everyone feels seen, valued, and connected.

Our Culture: Every employee plays a role in advancing our human-centered culture to ensure staff feel welcomed, supported, and empowered to thrive both personally and professionally. We believe work should be a joyful journey – one where collaboration, curiosity, creativity, and shared purpose inspire us to do our best work together.

Our Team: We are proud of the talented individuals who make up our team and the passion they show in service to our community. We walk with swagger and believe that we are “a really big deal!”. We believe in the power of a unified and prospering St. Louis community and see Nine PBS as an essential community institution that brings people together toward a stronger, more connected region.

Position Description:

Nine PBS has received $56 million in federal funding to lead Ready To Learn, a five-year national initiative advancing early literacy. The initiative brings together three educational media properties, family and community engagement, a national network of public media stations, and a robust research and evaluation infrastructure.

A key priority of this funding will include the hiring of a Director of Community Engagement to lead the coordination and management of public media station and national community partnerships. The Director manages the public media station RFP process, selection, contracting, onboarding, and ongoing engagement process; plans and executes Everyday Literacy Alliance conferences, convenings, and partner meetings; and ensures that learning from the local demonstration site is intentionally connected to and shared with participating stations and national partners.

The Director serves as a central connector across public media stations, national community partners, the local demonstration site, and internal project teams, supporting strong implementation, shared learning, collaboration, and the development of approaches that can be adapted and scaled across communities.

The ideal candidate is a collaborative, strategic leader who excels at building strong partnerships and bringing stakeholders together around a shared purpose. They are an exceptional relationship builder and project manager who can navigate complex, multi-partner initiatives while keeping people connected, informed, and moving toward common goals. They will bring strong communication, facilitation, and organizational skills, along with a commitment to listening and learning from communities and translating local insights into approaches that can be shared, adapted, and scaled nationally.

Primary Responsibilities: The following primary responsibilities are vital to successfully meeting the expectations of this position in an effective and efficient manner. This is not an exhaustive list and areas of focus may fluctuate between the primary and secondary responsibilities, as needed.

• Manage the full RFP process for participating public media stations, including development, outreach, application coordination, review, selection, notification, and onboarding.
• Manage station contracting and partnership agreements, coordinating deliverables, timelines, required documentation, and ongoing contract administration with internal teams.
• Plan and execute Everyday Literacy Alliance conferences, convenings, and meetings, including agendas, partner participation, programming, logistics, communications, and follow-up.
• Lead the alignment of local demonstration site work with participating public media stations and national community partners, to ensure lessons, resources, and promising practices inform national implementation.
• Lead the strategy to engage and support public media stations and national community partners throughout the initiative.
• Lead station and partner onboarding, orientation, ongoing communication, and relationship management.
• Support stations in developing and implementing community engagement strategies that connect local priorities and needs with the broader national initiative.
• Develop and coordinate opportunities for national partners to activate their resources, expertise, and relationships through participating public media stations and local communities.
• Convene stations and partners through learning sessions, communities of practice, peer exchanges, and collaborative problem-solving.
• Facilitate the exchange of learning between the demonstration site, station partners, and national partners to strengthen implementation across the network.
• Identify opportunities to expand and strengthen the initiative through new and existing station, community, and national relationships.
• Collaborate with content, education, communications, research/evaluation, grants, finance, and project leadership teams to coordinate partner needs, resources, deliverables, and implementation.
• Track station and partner contracts, deliverables, milestones, engagement, and implementation progress to support project management, grant reporting, and accountability.
• Gather feedback from stations and partners to identify implementation challenges, emerging needs, promising practices, and opportunities for continuous improvement.
• Identify and document scalable community engagement approaches and promising practices that can be shared across the public media system and partner network.
• Support development of station and partner toolkits, engagement guides, training materials, and implementation resources.

Secondary Responsibilities: These are additional activities expected to be performed in this position.

• Coordinate webinars, trainings, partner meetings, convenings, and national learning opportunities.
• Support communication and information sharing across the station and partner network.
• Maintain organized records of partnerships, station engagement, deliverables, and key activities.
• Document partnership successes, lessons learned, case studies, and examples of effective local activation.
• Represent the initiative at public media convenings, national conferences, partner meetings, and other sector events.
• Collaborate with communications teams to highlight station and partner stories and increase visibility of the national initiative.
• Contribute to sustainability and scaling strategies that strengthen the long-term national network of stations and community partners.

Qualifications: Bachelor’s degree required, with 3-5 or more years of experience in community engagement, partner relationship building, or other related fields. Experience working in non-profit, grant funded organizations required. Proficient with Microsoft 365 (Excel, PowerPoint, Word, Outlook, Teams). Experienced in tracking client relations in a CRM. Experience with project management tools like Monday.com is a plus.

Hybrid Schedule: This position is eligible for a hybrid schedule, typically working 2-3 days in the office each week. Must work on-site on Tuesdays, as well as attend all team meetings, one-on-one meetings, and all-staff meetings. Evening and weekend hours will be required at times, depending on the operational needs of the work. Some travel will also be required.

Additional Expectations and Core Competencies: Success in this role is not only measured by meeting the expectations outlined above, but also in how the work is performed. The following competencies are required for this role.

• Approach all interactions solution focused.
• Is open to feedback and demonstrates a growth mindset.
• Provide respectful feedback to others, as needed.
• Share knowledge, resources, and expertise openly to support team and organizational success.
• Effectively and proactively communicate important information to supervisor.
• Demonstrate effective time management.
• Demonstrate good judgment.
• Demonstrate effective working relationships with others that are collaborative and welcoming.
• Behave in a professional manner and represent the values of Nine PBS at all times.

Application Instructions

Company: Nine PBS

Vacancy Type: Full-Time, Exempt, Grant-funded

Job Location: St Louis, MO, US

Salary Range: $85,000 – $90,000 annually

Application Timeline: Open until filled

Application Process: For a candidate to be considered for employment, the following materials must be submitted as a complete application to jobs@ninepbs.org:

• Resume
• Cover Letter
• 3 Professional References (at least one previous supervisor; will not be contacted unless an offer is made)
• Provide a word document that includes responses to the following three questions:

• What have you read in this job posting that is inspiring to you? (no more than 150 words)
• What value-add would you bring to this role and to Nine PBS? (no more than 150 words)
• How does this role align with your career goals? (no more than 150 words)

Nine PBS

As an essential community institution, Nine PBS magnifies and deepens understanding of our community to help our region flourish. We tell stories that move us. We meet people where they are the most comfortable consuming content. Nine PBS’s platforms include four distinct broadcast channels (Nine PBS, Nine PBS KIDS®, Nine PBS World, and Nine PBS Create), ninepbs.org, social media, the free PBS Video App, streaming services, live and virtual events, and the Public Media Commons. Since 1954, Nine PBS has accepted the community’s invitation into their homes, schools, and businesses. Follow Nine PBS on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and TikTok.

Job Category

Development

P

Director of Community Engagement, Ready To Learn

Who We Are: As an essential community institution, we magnify and deepen understanding of our community to help St. Louis flourish. We believe St. Louis is strongest when we work together toward a shared vision. By rallying around a common purpose, we move beyond barriers that have previously hindered our progress and take collective action toward meaningful, lasting impact.

Strong

Our History:

Ul

• Manage the full RFP process for participating public media stations, including development, outreach, application coordination, review, selection, notification, and onboarding.

• Manage station contracting and partnership agreements, coordinating deliverables, timelines, required documentation, and ongoing contract administration with internal teams.

• Plan and execute Everyday Literacy Alliance conferences, convenings, and meetings, including agendas, partner participation, programming, logistics, communications, and follow-up.

• Lead the alignment of local demonstration site work with participating public media stations and national community partners, to ensure lessons, resources, and promising practices inform national implementation.

• Lead the strategy to engage and support public media stations and national community partners throughout the initiative.

• Lead station and partner onboarding, orientation, ongoing communication, and relationship management.

• Support stations in developing and implementing community engagement strategies that connect local priorities and needs with the broader national initiative.

• Develop and coordinate opportunities for national partners to activate their resources, expertise, and relationships through participating public media stations and local communities.

• Convene stations and partners through learning sessions, communities of practice, peer exchanges, and collaborative problem-solving.

• Facilitate the exchange of learning between the demonstration site, station partners, and national partners to strengthen implementation across the network.

• Identify opportunities to expand and strengthen the initiative through new and existing station, community, and national relationships.

• Collaborate with content, education, communications, research/evaluation, grants, finance, and project leadership teams to coordinate partner needs, resources, deliverables, and implementation.

• Track station and partner contracts, deliverables, milestones, engagement, and implementation progress to support project management, grant reporting, and accountability.

• Gather feedback from stations and partners to identify implementation challenges, emerging needs, promising practices, and opportunities for continuous improvement.

• Identify and document scalable community engagement approaches and promising practices that can be shared across the public media system and partner network.

• Support development of station and partner toolkits, engagement guides, training materials, and implementation resources.

Li

Coordinate webinars, trainings, partner meetings, convenings, and national learning opportunities.

A

jobs@ninepbs.org

Ol

• What have you read in this job posting that is inspiring to you? (no more than 150 words)

• What value-add would you bring to this role and to Nine PBS? (no more than 150 words)

• How does this role align with your career goals? (no more than 150 words)