Brooks named assistant athletic director for operations and media relations
July 9, 2013
Chris Brooks
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Gary Gray, director of athletics for the Alaska Nanooks, has appointed Chris Brooks as the assistant athletic director for operations and media relations and he assumed his duties on July 1.
"We're excited to have Chris stay with us in his new role as Assistant AD for Operations and Media Relations," Gray said "I know he has learned a lot the past two years in his internship role, and I am completely confident he is now ready to head up our media relations office. He will do a great job helping us spread the word about Nanook Athletics."
"This was an opportunity I believe the previous two years in Fairbanks has prepared me for," Brooks said. "I love what I get to do here every day at Alaska and I know I'm ready for this next step in my career."
Brooks continued, "I'd like to personally thank Dr. Gray for allowing me the opportunity to continue my growth in the profession and I'm excited to see what great things the media relations office and the department as a whole will accomplish in the near future."
Brooks will oversee the efforts of the media relations office in addition to game operations duties, ensuring that each home event is properly prepared for at the Patty Center and Carlson Center. He will be responsible for promoting each of Alaska's 10 NCAA-affiliated programs to local, regional and national media outlets and will actively promote the athletic department, teams, student-athletes and coaches on campus as well as the Fairbanks community.
In addition, he will serve as the primary sports information contact for hockey, men's and women's cross country, men's and women's skiing and rifle. Brooks will continue the growth of Alaska's social media and multimedia efforts through Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, as well as other new applications which will launch this fall.
Brooks was hired in Sept. 2011 as the Media Relations Assistant for the Nanooks and spent the previous two athletic years in that role as the primary media contact for men's and women's basketball, swimming and volleyball. He provided extensive multimedia coverage of all 10 sports through video packages, interviews and highlights and started a new coaches' show, Nanook Insider.
Prior to his coming to Alaska, Brooks was the Athletics Communications Assistant from 2010-11 at James Madison University, a Division I school in Harrisonburg, Va., and began his career in sports information as the Communications Intern at the Colonial Athletic Association, a Division 1 conference located in Richmond, Va., for the 2009-10 year.
He is an active member of CoSIDA (College Sports Information Directors of America) and has served media roles at the 2010 NCAA Women's Basketball Championship First and Second Rounds, the 2010 NCAA Women's Lacrosse Championship, the 2012 Arctic Winter Games and the 2012 NCAA Women's Basketball Final Four.
Brooks graduated from George Mason University in Fairfax, Va., in May 2009 with a bachelor's degree in Communication and during his time at Mason, he was an active leader in the student fan club, an assistant sports editor for the school newspaper and also worked two and a half years for the athletics department in events management and ticketing.