Faculty
Rick Davis
Rick Davis, vice president for alumni relations and annual giving, joined Northeastern University in May, 2015. He serves as lead strategist who has reimagined alumni relations with an integrated advancement objective to cement robust global network nodes of connectivity positioned throughout key strategic areas around the world. Since 2015, close to 20 global communities have been either refurbished or recreated to match Northeastern's growing global footprint. A diverse offering of online engagement activities and tools has also been constructed that account for more than 50 percent of the active engagement from the more than 280,000+ alumni network. A newly created career strategist service curriculum along with curated faculty outreach from all nine colleges have also been imported into Northeastern's alumni relations toolkit of services and experiences.
Rick comes to Northeastern from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he was the director of enrichment programs for the university's General Alumni Association for more than two decades.
Davis has been an active facilitator and presenter for CASE, CASE América Latina as well as CCAE. He received CASE's Crystal Apple for teaching excellence in 2015.
Prior to the University of North Carolina, Rick Davis worked at Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina, where he held multiple positions and managed several teams. He received the President's Service Award and Outstanding Employee Award. He has also held various marketing support positions at IBM. He received his bachelor's degree in business from the University of North Carolina and his master's degree from Duke University.
Julie Decker
Julie Decker is president and chief executive officer of the Florida State University Alumni Association. Decker has spent 20 years as an alumni relations strategist, having also worked in the alumni associations of the University of Georgia, the University of North Carolina, and Coastal Carolina University. Through her career she has managed programming, fundraising special projects, budgeting, student leadership, operations, and the cultivation of volunteers and boards.
Decker is passionate about the practice of Alumni Relations as an intentional partner to the overall advancement strategy.
Decker holds two degrees from the University of Georgia: a Bachelor of Arts in communication studies and a Master of Education in human resources and organizational development. In addition, she has completed doctoral coursework in organizational development and higher education at UGA, studying the changing landscape of alumni relations and advancement work.
Mo Cotton Kelly
“Mo,” as she is called by family, friends, and colleagues is the senior vice president for stakeholder engagement and chief of organizational operations (SVP-COO), with responsibility for driving operational and capital campaign strategy, overseeing key administrative functions, and guiding a culture of inclusivity for the UConn Foundation. Mo oversees the departments of alumni relations, marketing and communications, annual giving, stewardship, and board engagement.
Mo was recruited to join the UConn Alumni Association as the Executive Director and Assistant Vice President for alumni relations in 2014. Mo brought with her a national reputation for strong leadership built over two decades in higher education advancement. Mo is known for her ability to lead across departments while building collaborative relationships to enhance the experiences of staff, students, alumni, and friends.
Mo believes that mentorship and sponsorship of not only her staff and colleagues but also those from other institutions is incredibly important. She gives of her time and talent as much as she can and is currently an active member of the Case Board of Trustees. She has been on the faculty for the Case Minority Institute (MAI), Senior Alumni Relations Institute and was a member of the 2018 Case Summit planning committee.
Previously she was executive director of Bowling Green State University’s Alumni Association. Mo received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from BGSU.
Mo has more than 26 years of experience with higher education institutions in the university advancement field where she has developed exemplary leadership, created strategic plans, cultivated organizational change, and is known nationally as a leader in the industry.
Katrina Ward
Katrina Ward serves as the Director of Outreach & Engagement for the University of California, Office of the President and UCLA. In her role with UCOP, she leads alumni career engagement efforts across the ten campus University of California system. Under Katrina’s direction, UC has launched a number of innovative career programs aimed at uniting and supporting a community of over 2 million alumni.
At UCLA, Katrina oversees efforts to measure the impact, progress and success of alumni engagement activities through a comprehensive analytics framework and quarterly dashboard.
Prior to this role, Katrina served as the Executive Director of Alumni Career Initiatives and Partnership UCLA. In this role, Katrina designed and pioneered a transformative engagement program to support students in the transition from classroom to career by uniting alumni, faculty, and corporations to implement full-scale change in the academic classroom, co-curricular programs and virtual touchpoints.
As a Higher Education leader, Katrina has developed community partnerships and innovative career programs to serve students and alumni at UCLA, University of Denver, Pepperdine University, Santa Monica College and The New School University and currently teaches a vocational development course at NYU. Ward holds a Bachelor of Science in Human Development from Cornell University, a Master of Arts in Psychology, and a Master of Education in Counseling Psychology, both from Columbia University.