From the Nominator

Villanova’s annual day of giving, 1842 Day, has been rapidly elevated to a beloved staple of community impact in just four years since its inception in 2017. A typical 1842 Day in September involves on-campus student activities, tents around campus, a mobile crew of reporters streaming to Facebook live, and a broad digital solicitation strategy to engage constituencies. Much of this was rendered impossible by the COVID-19 pandemic, as on-campus activities were extremely limited. Villanova needed a way to raise support for critical areas on campus, preserve the levity and fun of the day, and balance the communication tightrope of a global pandemic, nationwide upheaval, and a looming election. 

Our solution was to pivot to an almost-entirely digital giving day centered around a 10-hour livestream broadcast. This broadcast was comprised of more than 50 live and pre-recorded interviews with faculty, students, alumni and University leadership; Athletics highlights; sponsored commercials; and live challenge and goal updates, all anchored by local celebrity alumni. The livestream was embedded into our website to allow viewers to easily make a gift or participate in other online activities. The result of this effort was a record-smashing fundraising day, surpassing all public and unpublished donor and dollar goals and the fulfillment of 17 donor challenges. The investment into this content has continued to positively impact giving conversations and fundamentally shift how we approach our annual giving days for the future.

From the Judges

Villanova University pivoted their giving day to do something completely different that would engage a huge community of stakeholders. This project went to incredible lengths to produce a huge amount of content, and engaged thousands of people in a full day of broadcasting. With on-campus activity limited, the team pulled together a 10-hour broadcast full of a range of activities, engaging student and alumni groups, key faces, and faculty. The focus of the pivot was to reach a wider audience, which proved incredibly successful, with impressive engagement statistics. This stood out as a huge-scale project that fundraised for 250 projects and raised more than $5 million, which was a good return on investment. We enjoyed the challenge elements of this activity, accompanied by the wide range of content used to engage stakeholders in their day, which was an impressive pivot from usual in-person activity and a step-up from previous giving days.