RAISE Podcast

Visit evertrue.com/remote to see all our COVID-19 resources and a summary of the key lessons from this podcast with Lynne. 

More about Lynne: https://www.donorrelationsguru.com/

On this episode of the RAISE podcast, Brent sits down with Kyle Vaughn, the Assistant Director of Athletic Fundraising at Ashland University. Kyle was an EverTrue 40 under 40 winner and our RAISE 2019 MVP. Kyle shares his perspective on building a community around athletics, and how he uses social media engagement and a giving funnel approach to fuel his donor pipeline. If you’re looking for someone to bring enthusiasm and optimism to any situation, look no further than Kyle Vaughn. Here we go! 

About Kyle

Kyle Vaughn is Ashland University’s Associate Director of Athletics Development.

Vaughn came to athletics from across campus, where he has been the university’s Director of Advancement Services for the previous 16 months. Included among his duties were gift processing, data analytics/reporting and metrics development and tracking. Prior to that, Vaughn served the campus in separate two-year stints as Director of Annual Giving, Assistant Director of Admissions and Registrar Representative.

Vaughn is a former Ashland University men’s soccer player. He is a 2006 AU graduate with a degree in Finance and Economics, and he earned his Masters of Business Administration from AU in 2014.

Vaughn and his wife, Jenise, along with his daughter, Arienne (age 9), and son, Oliver (6), reside in Ashland. Jenise (Smalley) played volleyball at AU, and teaches math and is the head volleyball coach at Ashland High School.

Peggy McCorkle is Associate Vice President for Annual and Leadership Giving at Boston College.

Megan Tiede is Executive Director, Advancement Engagement & Communications at Boston College

if you’re looking for guidance or support during the COVID-19 crisis, we’ve pulled together a library of resources to help you navigate this new normal. Check it out.

About Howard

Howard Heevner joined the University of California, Berkeley in 2019 as the Executive Director of Annual Programs. In his current role, he oversees Annual Giving, Leadership Annual Giving, Milestone Giving, Next Generation Giving, and Parent Philanthropy and Engagement.

With more than 20 years of higher education fundraising experience, he has held a number of roles. Prior to coming to Berkeley, Heevner was the Assistant Vice Chancellor of University Development Programs at UC Santa Cruz, the Director of Annual Giving at Penn State University, the Director of Annual and Special Giving at DePaul University and the Associate Director of Annual Giving at the University of Michigan. He began his career in development at the University of Iowa.

Howard has been a regular speaker at CASE conferences throughout his career and currently serves on the CASE District VII board. He has also worked with more than 30 institutions across the country to review the effectiveness of their annual giving programs.

Heevner earned his bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Iowa and his master’s degree in higher education administration from Penn State.

Howard is the chair of the CASE Advanced Annual Giving Strategies conference April 29- May 1. Learn more at https://www.case.org/conferences-training/advanced-annual-giving-strategies

About Ashley

Ashley Budd is director of digital marketing for alumni affairs and development at Cornell University. She is based in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., working remotely for the university as a digital strategist and project manager for the division. She runs a small team based in Ithaca, N.Y., executing social media, digital content and digital marketing analytics.

Prior to joining the digital team at Cornell, Budd spent more than five years at her alma mater, Rochester Institute of Technology, where she led social media strategy for undergraduate admissions. She serves as producer for the Higher Ed Live network, a podcast exploring innovations and trends in higher education. She speaks before national nonprofit groups and appears regularly at higher education conferences including Confab Events, NACAC, CASE, and HighEdWeb.

Ashley is an EverTrue 40 under 40 winner and the creator of a digital marketing newsletter for advancement professionals (sign up here).

On this episode of the RAISE podcast, Brent catches up with Nick Fulton from the University of North Carolina Rams Club, the fundraising arm that supports Carolina athletics. Nick and his team have ambitious goals to continue to grow membership and revenue while maintaining industry leading retention rates. Nick shares some of the innovative tactics the Rams Club is employing to accelerate relationship building with their next wave of prospective major gift donors. 

About Nick

Nick is the Director of the Annual Fund at The Rams Club – a 501(c)(3) organization whose mission is: Providing educational & athletic opportunities for Carolina student-athletes. He oversees efforts to grow membership and unrestricted giving. In 2017, Nick was part of the initial team responsible for a signature cross-unit initiative to develop a shared data warehouse between The Rams Club, Carolina Athletics & UNC Development. The resulting data warehouse has enabled data utilization across campus for communication segmentation, modeling & visualization. Nick has been with The Rams Club since 2011.

A swimming student-athlete, Nick holds a BA from the University of Wisconsin & an MS from the University of North Carolina.

Laura Day, Director of Annual Giving at Williams College, joins Brent Grinna on this episode of the RAISE podcast. Williams boasts one of the highest participation rates in the US. Six years into her tenure, Laura is constantly asking how to improve and is striving for 100% participation. She is an active participant in the Schuler initiative to increase young alumni engagement, and she will share the impact of that work. Laura is also a member of EverTrue’s inaugural 40 under 40 class.

About Laura

Laura Day is director of annual giving for Williams College, where she leads a team of ten staff members and 1,600 volunteers to run the college’s Alumni Fund. After graduating from Williams in 2004, Laura moved to New York and began working in arts administration. In 2010, she completed her MBA from Fordham University and decided to gain some practical fundraising experience in order to advance her career even further, and so she began volunteering for Williams as a class agent in her spare time.

That decision turned out to have been a pretty good one. In 2012, Laura returned to Williams in a professional capacity, working with the 30 oldest classes on their annual campaigns. In the fall of 2013, she became director of annual giving. Under Laura’s leadership, the Williams Alumni Fund has introduced multiple new initiatives around engagement and giving, and the fund itself has grown from $10M to over $13M while sustaining ~55% participation.

Want to hear more? Hear Laura share tips for managing Volunteer programs with Millbrook School.

About John

John Tatum Grice began his career in philanthropy as a Student Foundation member at Kansas State University serving within the K-State Proud Student Campaign. This experience jump-started his passion for higher education philanthropy. Following graduation in 2012, John began his tenure in KSU Foundation’s Annual Giving department focused on direct mail, phonathon, student philanthropy, and student life fundraising. In 2014, John moved to the Oklahoma State University Foundation, charged with developing student giving, young alumni programs, and digital giving strategies. In November of 2018, John accepted a role as the Director of Annual Giving at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

About Arup

Arup is the CEO and Co-Founder of Windfall. Windfall is a data company focused on modeling out the net worth of every person in the world. Prior to Windfall, Arup served as SVP, Product at Radius, a B2B predictive marketing company that raised over $125 million from firms like Founders Fund, AmEx Ventures, and Formation 8. Arup is also a product alum of GoodData and Box. Prior to business school, he worked at Updata Partners, a growth equity firm based out of Washington DC, and deployed over $45 million over 3 years. Arup started his career at Citigroup working in the Global Technology Investment Banking Group.