In the face of political and racial tensions spreading across the nation and the impact of a global COVID-19 pandemic that upended traditional norms, The University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff reached a historic fundraising milestone, generating $10.1 million: the best fundraising year in school history! The success represented 200% growth over five years, moving UAPB from an average of $2M annually to the historic $10.1M high. Such fundraising success at a Historically Black College or University (HBCU), especially a small public university, is unprecedented. HBCUs face many challenges regarding fundraising and alumni engagement, but with creativity, perseverance, and non-traditional thinking, exceeding your fundraising goals can become more than just a plan! Join us for an engaging, transformative session and learn how we overcame extreme challenges and barriers to create a successful, comprehensive fundraising strategy.
In this session, you will learn the following:
• How to exceed fundraising goals even when your Institutional advancement office is understaffed, underfunded, and overworked!
• How to think beyond the urgent and immediate needs to grow your endowment.
• How to maximize time and resources to cultivate major donors.
• How to diversify fundraising to make corporate and foundation giving a base for expanding major gifts, scholarships, and endowment building.
If you have a small fundraising team with BIG fundraising goals… this session is for you!

Fundraising is often described as both a science and an art. In pipeline building, we often only focus on the science of the equation by moving prospects in one direction of the donor pyramid. In this session, attendees will learn artful ways to rethink the traditional donor pipeline and strategies for collaborating with annual giving, prospect researchers, gift officers, and clinicians. Flipping the traditional model of donor acquisition that starts with annual giving and leads to major gifts, this session will highlight stories of successful collaboration and partnership with different starting points. Attendees will learn how to use this new model to increase donor engagement, new donors, and gifts.

Discover the Power of Planned Giving: Join us as we delve into a College Foundation's journey towards establishing a robust legacy program. Learn firsthand how strategic investments paved the way to identify and engage planned giving prospects, securing invaluable future gift intentions. Explore the Path to Lasting Impact: Uncover the transformative potential of planned gifts in ensuring the enduring success and sustainability of your institution. Gain insights into effective strategies for cultivating meaningful donor relationships and fostering a legacy of support. Join us as we navigate the roadmap to securing your institution's future through intentional planned giving initiatives

ChatGPT is the fastest-growing app in history. For many users, this is their first experience with generative AI — technology that is designed to create content. And it’s their first time encountering how AI will transform how we live, work, and fundraise. In this interactive workshop, we'll talk about the rise of AI, help everyone understand generative AI and large language models, and talk about data protection and privacy. We'll then spend time in an interactive prompt engineering workshop, showing how generative AI can increase efficiency, generate ideas, and become a part of your daily work.

Working with Parent Prospects and Donors: Best practices fundraisers need to know to start and enhance their work with parents. Giving from parents is an excellent way to identify new sources of philanthropy for your institution and many fundraisers aren't sure where to start. We'll discuss the differences between strategies for parent giving versus alumni giving, key data points to look for and best practices that can be implemented at any institution. This session is applicable for all levels of experience with parent giving.

To fully flex your fundraising muscle you need buy-in from both the annual giving and advancement services sides of the house. How do you achieve the alignment necessary to drive meaningful results? The devil is in the data. GiveCampus analyzed aggregate data from 4,532 campaigns and 4,973 giving forms to identify what’s moving the proverbial needle in fundraising and what’s not. Find out from fellow higher education fundraisers how they’re leveraging that data to drive decisions at key stages of the philanthropic lifecycle, and how they got everybody—including advancement services—to back their biggest bets.

Do you ever feel stuck with certain prospects or donors and are unsure of how to move conversations forward that may have stalled out (or never happened in the first place)? In this session, two frontline fundraisers will share their strategic process from moving prospects from stuck to solicitation and how they have partnered together to create a model of engagement that utilizes both of their skill sets and unique roles within donor and prospect relationships to expertly drive forward solicitation conversations and proposals.  Join this session to hear practical examples and case studies from this dynamic duo about collaboration and what to do (and not to do!) to generate activity and increase solicitations within your portfolios.