Tier 3, Fundraising: Interview with SVP Angela Minniefield( continued)
in what CDU is doing, and want to make a small investment or, volunteering their time, volunteering their treasure. But that can only happen if people know about CDU and the relationship building process.
The networking capability of your team members, your staff, family, friends, and faculty, is what gets you in the door. If I send a direct mail piece to somebody, and nobody follows up with a phone call and this person doesn’ t know CDU or somebody there, then the reality is the likelihood is probably very slim that that person is going to have an interaction with CDU.
If I asked you, Dr. Williams, to make a telephone call, after two weeks of me sending out the CDU Rising campaign brochure to somebody you know, and you ask,‘ Hey, did you get that brochure from Angela? Did you take a look at it?’ I like to call it the foot in the door technique. You know you need somebody to help get your foot in the door. And then when you do that, your story, your mission, your vision, your values, most of the time can sell itself. Or you take a student with you, or a faculty member who can inspire somebody about their research or their story. And let them share how a gift or a grant to the institution has made it better. Or how gift will make it better for them.
CDU has become a fundraising destination for a cross section of people and organizations. How has that unique connection been accomplished? And what are some of the distinctive benefits that the University offers to prospective donors?
For one thing, we have built and maintained a fundraising infrastructure, We regularly make appeals through our annual fund campaign appeal, Mission Maker. We regularly present special events that celebrate the community, celebrates our faculty, staff, and Board of Trustee members, such as the Spring Gala and Jazz at Drew. We regularly let people know that the University is on an upward trajectory through the President’ s State of the University Address. That helps us to develop a connection because people know that they can count on us for certain things at certain times.
What is the distinctive benefit? With the focus on COVID-19, and all of the increased focus on health disparities, health equity, and what that means to social justice, CDU has been a beacon of light in that area but had not been fully exposed. The silver lining? We’ ve been able to share what we’ ve been doing for
56 years. The Dean will call it a special sauce. I call it CDU doing what it what it does: for 56 years really focused on diversity, equity, inclusion, addressing research, addressing health disparities, addressing education disparities in a place like South LA. When people are looking for someplace that really shows that they want to embrace those three characteristics of diversity, equity, and inclusion, they’ re not looking any further than CDU.
If somebody is serious about supporting research that’ s designed to eliminate health disparities, they don’ t have to look any further. If somebody is about trying to advance economic opportunities for youth. Perhaps supporting second career individuals who need a leg up economically and decided to go to a health professions education program. We’ re producing graduates that can go right into jobs. That is a very unique perspective, because we’ re not just graduating liberal arts majors. We’ re not just graduating generalists. We are graduating“ A” students, we have faculty that represent the best of California’ s diversity, and the nation’ s diversity. That’ s what you get.
How do we create a sense that participating as a valued CDU donor increases the likelihood of creating a sustained continuous, even perpetual mindset of fundraising support for the University?
Well, because everything that we do, we’ re building for the long term. It’ s not one off. When we’ re getting these investments, we’ re asking for direct grants to meet a project need or direct assistance to student scholarships. But at the same time, we’ re also seeking to build our endowments, so that in times when there’ s a significant economic downturn, and maybe folks aren’ t donating as much, we still can rely on earnings from our endowment and not be hampered by the lack of investment.
We can point to where we were 10-11 years ago when our endowments for scholarships maybe totaled $ 500,000. Now they’ re at close to $ 10 million. We can at least guarantee that we’ re going to spend 41 / 2- 5 % of that endowment in perpetuity, when we get large gifts, like MacKenzie Scott’ s, or gifts from one time state funds. We’ re not spending that all up front, we are reserving and making sure that we set aside some funding that can be invested for the long term.
CDU College of Medicine | PG. 18