christine heenanChristine Heenan, Harvard's VP-public affairs/communications, is leaving in February for a senior communications adviser slot at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Heenan joined Harvard in 2008 from the Clarendon Group, which was her own PR/government relations shop.

Earlier she was director of community/government relations at Brown and senior policy analyst at President Clinton's White House Domestic Policy Council staff.

Harvard president Drew Faust told the Harvard Gazette the university benefitting from Hennan's "remarkable strategic sense and energetic leadership."

According to Faust, Heenan guided Harvard's "communications ambitiously forward into the digital age, overseen the transformation of the Harvard Gazette, strengthened essential relationships with communities and vigorously advanced the interests of higher education and research in Washington and beyond."

Faust said a search for Heenan's replacement has begun. Hennan will continue in a part-time role at Harvard through the end of the academic year.