Interact Welcomes Kym Browning as Vice President of Client Services

Blog September 30, 2020

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Interact Communications, a full-service marketing agency serving two-year community and technical colleges for 24 years, has announced Kym Browning as its new vice president of client services. Many community college marketing and PR professionals are familiar with Kym’s recent work as associate director of the National Council for Marketing & Public Relations (NCMPR), an affiliate of the American Association of Community Colleges that represents 650 colleges and more than 1,700 members across the United States and Canada. Kym also spent four years at North Idaho College, where the resort town community college celebrated Kym with its Rising Star of the Year Award in 2014. 

Kym’s collaborative NCMPR experience shapes her new role in assisting Interact’s clients coast-to-coast in their mission to serve their diverse students and communities. Her robust strategic planning and project management expertise, which includes serving as conference and events coordinator at North Idaho College, will also help Interact grow its own service-oriented outreach and programming initiatives.

“I got to know Interact as a business partner while working for NCMPR and saw firsthand the impact of Interact’s knowledge and guidance on community college marketers,” shared Kym, who joined Interact this September. “Interact has a true passion for two-year colleges. I’m proud to be working with an organization that offers such a high level of research, insights, and marketing expertise.”

Like many of her teammates at Interact, Kym got her start in the news industry, working on the programming and sales side of television news in Idaho and Denver. She also worked at a local Idaho marketing agency before shifting to healthcare marketing. At Portneuf Medical Center, she coordinated the inaugural “Brake for Breakfast” breast cancer event that is now 20 years strong. At Delta Dental of Idaho, she raised legislative awareness of the importance of dental health to an individual’s overall health. At NCMPR, she provided planning support to the organization’s volunteers, regional district directors, and Medallion award coordinators to help them better serve their membership.

But what truly sparked Kym’s career passion is a summer job she held during college at a Forest Service district office, where she initially worked as a firefighter. Knowing she was studying communication at Oregon State University, Kym’s supervisor soon deployed her as a communication assistant when an extreme fire activated their incident command team. For two weeks, Kym lived in a fire camp, participated in early morning command meetings to gather updates, and drove 60 miles to the nearest town to write, report, and broadcast the fire updates and send the latest release to the news wires. She also met with local business owners to hear their concerns, before returning to camp and posting lighthearted news to keep up the spirits of more than 1,500 firefighters. 

Adept at handling crisis situations, even in the great outdoors, Kym’s career and personal interests dovetail with her life philosophy to “Work hard and play hard.” An outdoor enthusiast, she grew up on a small farm outside Portland, Oregon. Today, Kym enjoys camping, hiking, flyfishing, kayaking, and snowshoeing with her husband, Mark, also a community college leader at College of Western Idaho. The couple, now empty nesters, have three sons and two granddaughters, and a grandson on the way.

Kym holds a B.S. degree in communication from Oregon State University. She is on the board of directors for The Cabin, a literary arts nonprofit organization that recognizes the importance of writers, readers, and learners and their impact on the voice of the community.