Bill Mahon has been named assistant vice president for University Relations and director of Public Information for the University. Mahon has worked as director of the Department of Public Information at Penn State — an office of writers, editors, photographers, videographers and web developers — for the past 16 years.
The division of University Relations is responsible for public information, marketing, advertising, publications, special events and development communications at Penn State. Mahon is responsible for promoting faculty research and student accomplishments, and representing Penn State to the media and the public. His office has developed a number of news and information Web sites for the University. It is responsible for producing a weekly faculty-staff newspaper, Intercom, with 21,000 subscribers at the University's 24 campuses.
Six years ago, the Department of Public Information also created the Penn State Newswire, an e-mail-based daily news service with more than 100,000 subscribers from 51 countries.