PORT ANGELES — Rhonda LoPresti is moving from health care to education.
Olympic Medical Center’s director of marketing, communications and physician recruitment has been named executive director of the Peninsula College Foundation, the foundation announced Friday.
LoPresti, hired by college President Tom Keegan, begins her new job May 16, giving the hospital time to hire a replacement, she said Friday.
Her last day at the hospital will be May 13.
LoPresti will be the college’s primary fund-raiser. Founded in 1961, the school had 10,418 students in the 2003-2004 school year.
“When you have the opportunity to come full circle to a place that has meant a lot to you to lend skills and ability to help it grow, it means a lot,” said LoPresti, 43, a Peninsula College graduate.
She will replace interim foundation director Mary Jacobs, who took over for Maitland Peet, who resigned as director at the end of December but remains at the college.
Peet resigned “to move on to other opportunities,” he said Saturday.
“I also am interested in working more closely with students and in making a move into the student services area of the college,” he said.
Less pay
LoPresti has yet to sign a new contract but will make less than her current $88,000 a year salary with the hospital, she said.
LoPresti is a Peninsula College graduate and has three children: Natalie Thacker, 15, a Port Angeles High School sophomore; Maria Thacker, 17, a Running Start student at the college, and Luke Thacker, 21, a Peninsula College student.
“Money is very important, but it isn’t everything,” LoPresti said.
“A very big factor is I’ve never seen [the college] so poised for growth and becoming an even greater asset to the community.
“I am honestly so excited to be a part of that because it hasn’t been at this juncture in the years I’ve been here.”