St. Thomas started this semester off right with $100,000 in donations. $50,000 was donated to the Great Books program by former CEO and President of Irving Oil Mike Asher.
“[Asher] is a firm advocate of liberal arts education and the Aquinas program structure and also the Great Books program,” said vice president of alumni relations Jeff Wright. “Asher is not an alumnus, but he is a philosopher at heart.”
An anonymous alumnus donated the other $50,000 to the history department.
“His gift was fuelled by a very positive learning experience with the department of history, in particular professor Dr. Tony Rhinelander.
“We tried to find an intersection in between the donor’s interests and the department’s needs.”
They decided on experimental learning. The donation will help a few students to get a hands-on learning experience that they would not normally be able to afford.
“These gifts are not spontaneous. These gifts are results of long-standing personal relationships with the university. There is always, in our world of fundraising and advancement, gifts of serendipity, where things sort of just fall into your lap. These are not that,” said Wright. “This business is about building relationships. My job is to build, maintain and sometimes repair corporate and personal relationships that hopefully one day will result in financial support of our university and our students.”
Jeff Wright’s first year anniversary at St. Thomas is this week. So far, he has improved the amount of donations to STU and strengthened relationships with alumni.
The number of unique alumni attending events last fiscal year was 450. As of Oct. 31 of this school year, which is only about half way through this fiscal year, the department has already reached 452.
Last school year, St. Thomas had a total of 472 donors. As of Dec. 31, there have been 594 donors.
“They are small gifts, but they make a big difference.”
Besides alumni events, Wright has tried to find other ways to build up trust and intrigue in the university.
With the launch of the Liberal Arts Advantage program last semester, alumni have become more involved by mentoring current students.
Something else the department would like to do in the future is to look to alumni to recruit students and for alumni to be more involved in the production and the content in STU’s alumni magazine, Connections.
Wrights’ biggest goal is to improve the number of alumni donations.
“Our goal is to double the number of alumni who give to St. Thomas every year for the next three years.”
Originally from Halifax, Wright moved out west after graduation to start his career in fundraising and alumni relations. He worked for nine years at the University of Alberta and three at McEwan University.
Wright said he is happy to be back in the Maritimes, and he is happy his family is doing so well here.
“I can’t believe how much I’ve fallen in love with New Brunswick. It gives me goose bumps.”
With his family’s happiness, he has been able to focus on work. And he hopes more alumni realize that programs like the STU Fund will help to fuel the emerging needs of the faculty and students on campus.
