Senior Director, Community Relations
Kathleen Fuchs Hritz is the senior director for community relations within Vanderbilt’s Division of Government and Community Relations. Hritz joined the GCR division in March of 2023 and has positioned the Vanderbilt Community Relations team as a facilitator, connector, and convener for local external partners and Vanderbilt University students, staff, faculty, and resources. Community Relations supports nonprofit organizations financially and in partnership through the Community Impact Fund, convenes campus partners through the Vanderbilt University Community Engagement Collaborative, and facilitates collaborative programming with nonprofit partners.
Kathleen Fuchs Hritz is an experienced higher education administrator with an extensive background in nonprofit management and community building, has joined the Vanderbilt Division of Government and Community Relations as senior director of community relations.
Hritz is a committed and skilled connector, collaborator and communicator with 15 years of experience designing and leading programs for community impact in Nashville. She most recently was assistant director for Vanderbilt’s Turner Family Center for Social Ventures at the Owen Graduate School of Management, where interdisciplinary graduate students engage in experiential learning and leadership development focused on social impact through business.
While at Owen, Hritz launched and led the Owen Board Fellows program, which places MBA students on nonprofit boards in Nashville for one-year fellowships to apply their business education through community leadership experience. Before joining Vanderbilt in 2016, Hritz’s work with the YMCA of Middle Tennessee’s Latino Achievers program focused on college access, leadership development and career success in Nashville for first-generation immigrant students.
She earned a bachelor’s degree in human organizational development and Spanish from Vanderbilt. She graduated with a master’s degree in civic leadership in 2014 from Lipscomb University and completed Vanderbilt’s Executive MBA program in 2022.
Hritz serves on the boards of the Community Resource Center and FUTURO, a college leadership and professional network for first-generation Latino students, and previously served on the Nashville Mayor’s New American Advisory Council.