SALISBURY — Erin Phillips Stringer, a 2005 graduate of Catawba College, is the school’s new director of alumni and parent relations.

The Pennsylvania native arrived on campus to assume her new role in the development office on June 19.

For more than five years, Stringer was associate director of  young alumni programs at Gettysburg College in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. In that role, she was responsible for helping graduating seniors in the transition to becoming philanthropically focused alumni. She planned Gettysburg’s homecoming weekends and coordinated reunion programs. She collaborated with Gettysburg College’s communications and marketing office to develop social media and email communications and design web pages that aligned with the college’s strategies for communications, engagement and fundraising.

“Catawba is very fortunate to bring back an alumna the caliber of Erin Stringer. Her professional experiences, Catawba knowledge and engaging personality are sure to resonate with our constituents,” said Catawba President Brien Lewis.

Before her job at Gettysburg College, Stringer spent was an admissions counselor at Catawba between 2009 and 2011. She coordinated the alumni ambassador program and directed the junior admissions representative program, as well as managed a recruiting territory for prospective students that included Alabama, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas and West Virginia.

A political science major at Catawba with a minor in English, Stringer’s went to Washington immediately after her graduation and worked from 2005 to 2006 as a clerk on the Government Reform Committee’s Subcommittee on Government Management, Finance and Accountability. From 2006 to 2007, she was a press aide and legislative correspondent for U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Davis of Virginia.

Leaving Washington, she spent two years as a customer service representative for M&T Bank in Wayne, Pennsylvania, before returning to Salisbury as an admissions counselor.

“Within the field of alumni relations, I see no greater honor than to be entrusted to foster and strengthen meaningful connections between alumni and college at one’s own alma mater. I am humbled and invigorated to take on this role at our Catawba, and I thank President Lewis and the development team for this opportunity,” Stringer said of her new position.

Stringer has served as a presenter since 2015 for Academic Impressions on the topics of young alumni Ccouncils and also co-wrote a paper for Academic Impressions titled “Should You Start a Young Alumni Council?” She was a workshop presenter of “Going BOLD: Young Alumni Programs at Gettysburg College” for the 2013 CASE District II Conference, where she received a Gold Award for her work developing Gettysburg’s Young Alumni Leadership program.

As an undergraduate at Catawba, she was captain of the cross-country team. She was a member of Phi Epsilon honor society and was perennially on the Dean’s List and Presidential Honor Roll.

She is married to Stephen Stringer, a 2011 Catawba alumnus. They have a son, Ryan Phillip, born in April 2015.