As a part-time department chair, I found that the percentage of my time spent on fundraising and development per week progressively grew with each year of service. Ensuring vital annual giving programs alone take a significant amount of time and energy to nurture, grow, and steward. Working with Foundation staff toward cultivating large gifts takes significant energy, as well.
I have been fortunate to have received training in fundraising and development through the National Association of Schools of Music (NASM) and through the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE). I learned the nuts and bolts of annual giving through NASM and through service at FHSU as campus chair of the Tiger Phonathon in the early 2000s. This was an opportunity for me to develop relationships with FHSU alumni which became very important when capital campaigns were launched in the early 2000s and again now in 2016. Between the years 2000-2005, I raised nearly $250,000 in new funds for the FHSU Department of Music through a combination of annual giving initiatives and stewardship of planning giving donors.
Cultivating and stewarding existing and new donors is a task I enjoy undertaking. The opportunity to have meaningful conversations about the programs I represent and to create “joyful giving” is important to me.
Timothy R Crowley 