University of Tampa Gets 10M$ Gift from Howard and Patricia Jenkins

University of Tampa has received one of the largest gifts in the school’s history from Howard and Patricia Jenkins. In honor of the donation, there will be a residence hall named after the Jenkins couple at the University of Tampa. The 11-story West Kennedy Hall, which was completed in August 2013 and houses 528 students will be re-named the Jenkins Hall.

The Donors

Howard Jenkins, serves on the executive committee of University of Tampa’s Board of trustees and chairs the board’s planning committee. Mr. Jenkins also serves as the Chairman and President of Jenkins Clinic, Inc.  He started his career with Publix Super Markets in 1966 and served as its CEO since 2001.

Patricia Jenkins founded Apollo Environmental Inc. ,which specializes in hazardous materials consulting and analysis, expert witness testimony and regulatory compliance.

Howard and Patricia Jenkins have made some significant impacts on so many cultural and educational areas in Tampa Bay, and University of Tampa is pleased to welcome the couple to the UT community according to the university president Ronald L. Vaughn.

The Relationships 

For insight into the relationships which may have been the catalyst behind the gift, see this connections report from Prospect Visual to see who may have acted as an influencer for UT.

Networking Chatter via Wall Street Journal Blogs:

Selling part of your company is a lot like seeing your child walk off to their first day of kindergarten and start a life without you. It’s an important moment, a time for reflection — and a little terrifying.

Finding and then attracting the right investor can feel impossible, especially if it’s your first time raising capital…

Leverage your network. To begin the process, you’ll want to look to the people closest to you. Your circle often turns out to be a lot larger than you think when you add in your alumni networks, colleagues, relatives, clients and social media connections. Look for people who are involved in investments or have started companies themselves. Start the process of reaching out to them for ideas. If you don’t already, start having regular lunches and coffees with old friends and colleagues.

– Miles Jennings, “Next-Level Networking” via The Accelerators. (Read Original Article here)

Michigan State University gets $25m from Billionaire Couple

Eli and Edythe Broad of the eponymous College of Business at Michigan State University surprised and delighted students and officials alike last weekend with the announcement of a $25 million “challenge donation” to kickstart a $1.5 billion fundraising goal which the institution hopes to achieve by the end of 2018.

Eli Broad is the architect of two Fortune 500 companies – KB Home and SunAmerica – and is a long time friend of the school. His connection with the institution is obvious in the name of the Business school and confirmed by the relationship report below, provided by Prospect Visual.

Proof yet again that an organization’s largest donors tend to be those who have strong relationships with them.

If you’re interested in finding out which prospective donors are most likely to become your donors, use relationship mapping to investigate which ones have strong connections to your institution. Contact the Prospect Visual team for a free demo to find out more.

100% accurate Alumni Append for Educational Institutions from Prospect Visual

“We’ve been working very closely with educational institutions on relationship mapping projects for a long time and, as a result, we appreciate how important alumni employment data is to their fundraising efforts. As more and more people put their information online, we have found ourselves in a unique position to help universities and other educational institutions by using our proprietary data-gathering software to scrub the web for that information.

“We estimate that we can deliver profiles on 35-50% of an institution’s entire alumni database, and we guarantee both 100% accuracy and a high match rate. Most importantly – because we understand how important it is to have the most current information – our service also includes quarterly updates to highlight any changes that have taken place after the initial delivery of the data.”

– Tatia Zuloaga, Director of Sales & Marketing via www.prospectvisual.com

 

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Networking Chatter:

A distinguishing characteristic of self-made millionaires is that they network everywhere. Most important, they do it all the time–at business conferences, at the health club, on the golf course or with the person sitting next to them on a plane. This fact alone should motivate you to place yourself in situations where you can meet new people.

– Ivan Misner via Facebook.com (Click here to view original post)

$4.26m to Taylor University shows the power of alumni

While perusing through the news reports today we came across this interesting item about a donation to Taylor University in eastern Indiana. The gift – a generous $4.26 million – came not from a single donor but from a group of alumni celebrating their 50-year reunion.

The university explained that the group had been planning to make this gift as a result of alumnus Ron Scott’s challenge to his classmates from 1964 to make a memorable gift to their former school to celebrate their reunion. Though Scott passed away last year, his peers took up his challenge and came through with their generous gift.

We think this is a heartwarming story that proves that the connection between graduates and their alma mater is very strong and – given the right set of circumstances – can be a powerful aid to any institution’s fundraising.

University of Redlands gets $35m from former Board Members

During Homecoming celebrations this Saturday,  it was announced that the University of Redlands has created a scholarship program with the help of a $35 million donation from Richard Hunsaker and his wife Virginia.

The scholarship will be named the Richard and Virginia Hunsaker Scholarship Fund and will benefit future students of College of Arts and Sciences.

The Hunsakers are very important donors for the University of Redlands. Both are former students at the school who graduated in 1952 and both have previously served on the school’s Board of Trustees. As a result both will have relationships with high-level constituents at the school.

This connections report from Prospect Visual shows the links between Richard Hunsaker and the university’s existing and past board members – and gives us a clue as to why the Hunsakers continue to enjoy a close relationship with their alma mater.

Infiltration!

Research in Motion

Hello, friends! It has been way too long since I posted an update, so I promise this one will be a good one!

First off, I’m excited to say that I cleared the 100,000 miles flown mark some time over the summer. By the end of September, I should be past 120,000, so I’m averaging about 10,000 miles a month. Whoa! Of course, Hong Kong skews that a bit- when I remove that trip from the calculations, I’m still at a respectable 8,500 miles per month.

I’m sure many of you attended the APRA conference in July/August. I read many of your excellent blog posts on the conference and felt motivated to post my own. Then August and most of September happened, and I lost my chance…or so I thought! But then last week, I attended the Association of Donor Relations Professionals Conference in Seattle, and my opportunity to reflect…

View original post 1,328 more words

Why businessman Les Muma gave $25m to University of South Florida

Over the weekend it was announced that Tampa based businessman and philanthropist Les Muma and his wife Pam, were to donate $25 million to the University of South Florida.

The gift is the largest individual gift in the school’s history and as a result the College of Business will be renamed as the USF Muma College of Business with immediate effect. .

Why did the Muma’s donate?

When looking into the reasons behind the couple’s incredible generosity towards USF, we were unsurprised to find that they had very strong links to the school.

Les Muma is an alumnus who graduated in 1966 and he and his wife have a past history of making donations to the school and are in fact (as a result of this most recent donation) the largest donors in the institution’s history. Les has even served as the the chart of the USF Foundation’s Board of Directors in the past.

With such strong connections to the school, it’s no wonder the Muma’s would choose USF to be a beneficiary of their charitable giving.

What USF did next…

USF have been quick to show their gratitude – recognizing the need to continue to nurture their relationships with their largest donors.

In a statement released by the University, USF Foundation CEO Joel Momberg said “Pam and Les Muma have a deep and real passion for the University of South Florida, its students and its faculty. This transformative gift for the USF College of Business exemplifies this, and in naming the Muma College of Business, we forever recognize this legacy of support.”

Please click here if you wish to view the official press release.

The Wilson Family & their connections to Duke University

A few days ago we posted an article about the relationship between the University of Tennessee and the Haslam family. A connection which has resulted in a series of generous donations for the school.

Today we wanted to take a look at Duke University and their relationship to the Wilson family. Below is a relationship report generated by Prospect Visual revealing the connections between the school and Gary L Wilson.

The report shows many strong connections – and no wonder.  The Wilsons have a long history with Duke. Gary Wilson, a running back on the football team for two championship years, was a ’62 graduate of Trinity college. Derek Wilson earned a bachelor of arts degree in economics from Duke in 1986 and an MBA from The Fuqua School of Business in 1990. Derek’s mother, Susan Moody Wilson, also graduated from the Woman’s College at Duke in 1962. His daughter, Trinity, is currently a student there too.

How has the relationship benefitted Duke?

If you’re a regular reader you already know that we believe that relationships can be a powerful philanthropic catalyst. So we weren’t surprised to discover that Duke’s strong links to the Wilson family has been extremely beneficial to the school.

This year alone, the Wilson family has committed a $3 million to Duke University. Previously Derek Wilson and his wife Christen have donated two works of art to the Nasher Museum and contributed to the purchase of three others. Wilson is also a founding board member of Fuqua’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. The family donated $5 million in 1996 to fund the construction of The Wilson Recreation Center and last year.

That Duke understands the importance of maintaining their links with the Wilsons is evident in the fact that they have not hesitated to honor the family by putting their name on the projects that have supported. In fact a gate at the newly renovated Wallace Wade Stadium is due to be named for the Wilson family in honor of Gary’s $2 million gift to Duke Athletics last year.

What does this mean for your organization?

All of the above reiterates the importance of cultivating and maintaining relationships with high-capacity donors. It can be a mammoth task – especially if you’re not exactly sure about your institutions connections.

That’s where a relationship mapping product such as Prospect Visual can help, allowing you to identify relationships quickly and accurately and ensuring that you are aware of the prospects who are within your reach and the relationships that can help you engage them.

If you’d like to find out more, feel free to get in touch right now.