Columbus Foundation Fellowship Programs

Hello There,

It’s already been one month into this wonderful new year, but I just thought I should recap on 2015.

December was the busiest month for the Furniture Bank all year! In the month of December, there was a huge influx of gifts that I had to record, organize, and acknowledge, on top of gathering up outreach material for our Spring Fundraising Event. I definitley admint that December was quiet a crazy work month.

Over Christmas break, I had the opportunity to work actual full 9 hour days at the Furniture Bank of Central Ohio, which gave me a real insight on real world work life. I got to experience rush hour traffic as well as the satisification of walking out of the office and crossing everything off of my to do list.

Here are some of the things that I worked on in the month of December:

• HUGE influx of gifts, acknowledments, and organization of gifts through Raiser’s Edge
• Drafting emails for recruiting teams, vendors, sponsors, and volutneers for our Bed Race to take place May 2016
• Organizing volunteer contact and attendance
• Managing social media
• Helping the Furniture Bank prepare for the opening of our NEW Furniture/Clothing/Appliances Thrift Store on Morse Road!

When you’re at work for only 4 hours a day, two times a week, it can be really hard to get everything on your to-do list completed. Time management is KEY on top of attending meetings on time and completing assignments on time.

I’m getting very excited about planning for The Furniture Bank of Central Ohio’s 1^st Annual Bed Race to take place May 21, 2016! I encourage everyone to stop by for some food, music, racing, and fun! Might as well make your own team while you’re at it!

Looking forward to a great 2016!Click here to learn more about the Bed Race!

My time at USN since my last blog post has been very exciting! First, I definitely feel like I’m becoming a lot closer to my co-workers in the development office. I’ve appreciated how everyone is happy to help each other. Additionally. I’ve been able to communicate easily with the Columbus Collegiate Academy (CCA) at Dana Avenue as I was wrapping up my grant application for a new playground at their campus.

In regards to the event planning for Launch Bash, which takes place on May 13, 2016, I was fortunate enough to participate in a very productive meeting with the Special Events Team. There is a lot of collaboration happening with sponsorships, raffle gift options, and so much more. I learned that there are a lot of little steps to take into consideration when planning such a large event and each step is very important.

I’ve been able to visit the CCA-Dana Ave. campus twice so far. The first time included watching a professional violinist perform for the students during their music class, which was definitely fun to watch! The second time included a meeting with the COO of USN and a representative from BSN Sports to talk about our options with a potential new playground. I was able to present what my grant application included and what I hoped to see at CCA-Dana Ave. in regards to the playground renovation. The couple of days after the meeting I wrapped up the grant application with the help of the amazing people at USN and my supervisor, Carmen has graciously agreed to tie up any loose ends before the deadline.

I’m looking forward to even more fun and exciting times at USN in 2016!

Month two is in the books and I am starting to get deeper into a few projects! The Zoo’s Philanthropy Team is in the midst of revising our donor recognition strategies and stewardship plans and I have been excited to be a part of this endeavor.

Over the next few weeks, I will be connecting with our peer zoos to learn more about their experiences with a number of different initiatives, specifically their various commemorative and tribute gift options. I have been fortunate to make connections with several leading Zoos and Aquariums across the country from San Diego to Saint Louis. The conversations with these Zoos are ongoing but are already leading to valuable insights regarding current best practices in donor recognition. I am looking forward to bringing this research to the table and collaborating with our philanthropy team to develop the best options for our Zoo moving forward.

Looking forward, I am eager to see how this work focusing on commemorative and tribute gifts will compliment my earlier work and help create comprehensive donor recognition and stewardship strategies for the Zoo moving forward.

My experience with the Zoo has also been further enhanced by the educational opportunities made available to me through the Columbus Foundation. This past week, I was able to attend three educational sessions hosted by the Association of Fundraising Professionals in Davis Hall at the Columbus Foundation. These events are always very comfortable and inviting given the Zoo’s philanthropy team’s significant presence within our professional community. Although the topics explored in these sessions were wide-ranging, I was particularly interested in the points about actionable steps that can be taken towards creating a culture of philanthropy. I believe the conversations around this topic will help me provide more thoughtful and valuable work for the duration of my Fellowship.

The beginning of my fellowship can be described in three words- Research, Discussion, and Learning.

As mentioned in my last post I started research on topics including gift acceptance policies, investment policies, and spending rules. This continued with contacting other Boys and Girls Clubs around the U.S., contacting other local nonprofit organizations, contacting the development staff at my University,”googling”, reading BGCA manuals, etc. This allowed me to collect different perspectives on how to formulate these policies. After my research I was able to create a gift acceptance policy draft and an investment guidelines draft suited for our organization’s mission and objective. Creating these drafts entailed a lot of thorough discussions, primarily with our director of Development, Hilary Blakemore.

Due to my research and discussions I have learned a tremendous amount of new information thus far. A few examples-

• A Basis Point is equal to 1/100th of 1% and is a common unit of measure for interest rates.
• That Inter Vivos (Latin) is a legal term referring to a transfer or gift made during one’s lifetime, as opposed to a testamentary transfer.
• That the Standard & Poor’s (S&P) 500 is an American stock market index designed to be the leading indicator of U.S. equities and is meant to reflect risk/return characteristics.
• Different types of Asset Allocation mixes, for example a “Traditional Mix” comprised of a basic 65/35 stock/bond split.

On another note, I am really enjoying getting to know everyone in the BGCC Organization and having the opportunity to get involved in different aspects. First I got to attend an event sponsored by the Columbus Blue Jackets where they taught the kids at Milo-Grogan hockey skills and rules of the game. The same week we got to attend a Blue Jackets game and see the action live. I also attended the opening ceremony of the newly renovated learning center at Milo-Grogan, sponsored by Columbus Crew SC! Next up is our Christmas Party! Below are some pictures from the aforementioned events.

Hello Everyone,

It has been three months into the fellowship now and I can definitely say that I underestimated the work!

For the Furniture Bank of Central Ohio, I manage social media, build peer to peer fundraising platforms, discuss marketing projects, and handle gifts via Raiser’s Edge.

Handling social media is definitely not as easy as it looks. I am at the office two days a week, so I miss a lot of the action that happens when I’m at school. Therefore, I am constantly checking my work email to make sure I am keeping up with all the important events and updates that I can share on social media.

I had the opportunity to attend a Fundraising and Social Media Management seminar this month with the Furniture Bank. A lot of the seminar spoke about how to use different social media platforms. However I learned quite a bit of useful information:

Social media plays a huge role in the “brand” of a non-profit. Therefore it’s really important to make simple, yet effective posts that are posted at the right time during the day to catch the desired audience. For instance, did you know that the best time to post to facebook is between the hours of 8am-8:30am, 12-3pm, and at 9pm?

Interestingly enough, the time you post to facebook is extremely important. If you post at a time that is not listed above, it is most likely that your post will not be seen 1-3 hours later.

I always thought I was an “expert” of social media. However managing your own personal social media is very different from managing your employer’s social media. Remember that a non-profit’s brand is based primarily on social media! So post vibrant, simple, and efficient posts during the lunch hour and the evening to reach the most people in your network!

As the holidays are approaching, I am finishing that last touches on our peer:peer fundraising campaign using Blackbaud’s Sphere software. I am enjoying getting to learn how to build peer:peer sites and hope to add this skill to a future job!

Until next time!

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!

Hello!

My name is Arielle Johnson. I am senior at Capital University studying Sociology with minors in Philosophy and Ethnic Studies. I am currently completing my fellowship at the Charitable Pharmacy of Central Ohio. The Charitable Pharmacy seeks to provide affordable and appropriate pharmaceutical services to the most vulnerable in our community. My time as a Sociology major has inspired my passion about social issues that affect so many within our communities. This fellowship has provided me with the opportunity to work closely with an organization that seeks to provide relief to an important issue within our community.

As a fellow, I am working within the Development department. One of the many tasks I am working on is social media outreach. Social media has become a platform that provides immense opportunities for fundraising and outreach. I am capable of keeping all followers up to date on what is new at the pharmacy, as well as highlighting those who are very important to the pharmacy, such as the volunteers and staff. Coming up with new and creative ways that catches people’s eye has made me reflect on my own social media experience. Through this work I have been able to provide content that is important to the Charitable Pharmacy and those who support it, as well as understand the important place social media has within development and fundraising.

This experience at a small up-and-coming non-profit has given me an insight to all of the work and passion that is needed to be able to give patients what they need. I have been able to interview staff members about why they serve their communities and they tell me they have a duty as a community to help those who are in need. One woman, a staff member wrote to me, “if it’s gonna be, it’s up to me.” She said that this attitude enhances our community and our world. Not only does this make me proud to be a part of an organization like the Charitable Pharmacy, but also continues to fuel my passion about social issues.

Hello all!

My name is Haley Duff, I am a senior at Ohio State studying Community Leadership in the College of Food, Agriculture, and Environmental Science. I’m very excited to be completing my fellowship this year at Local Matters. Local Matters is dedicated to making an inspiring impact on the Columbus community through healthful food access and education. Knowing the rate of diet-related diseases and how important nutrition is to kids success in school and their future, I feel passionate about Local Matters’ mission and was excited to learn of my placement and being working with them. 

Within Local Matters, I am working with the communications and development team on a number of upcoming projects that I see incredible learning potential in. When I first started, the team was wrapping up a large annual fundraiser event they put on called Harvest Ball. While I started a little to late to be involved with planning the event, I did get to see all the work that goes in to after such a large scale event. Individually thanking every person who came and donated is a tremendous undertaking, and seeing how important donor stewardship is to the success of the organization is was eye opening. Now the main focus of the team is in their end of the year campaign, which is doubling as a huge capital campaign.

Local Matters is in the process of moving to a big beautiful new office space that will have all the resources within it that they currently rent out from local churches and other space. I’m very excited to work with them on the capital campaign, as I know it will be excellent experience moving forward with my career to be able to draw on the success of it. So far my involvement has been in some online crowdfunding efforts, and writing some copy for emails to be sent out. I’m grateful for the opportunity to learn from such experienced, kind, and passionate people.

So far one of the coolest experiences I’ve had as a member of the team was being at my first full staff meeting, which was used as a brainstorming session for a new tagline or slogan for Local Matters. It was so interesting to me how just changing the order of words can make a totally different impact on a brand and identity! Everyone at Local Matters is so passionate about the mission, it was inspiring!

Hello!

My name is Danielle Francis and I am a senior at The Ohio State University studying Early and Middle Childhood Studies. I am fortunate enough to have the opportunity to work as a fundraising and development fellow for Catholic Social Services.

“Motivated by faith, Catholic Social Services helps poor and vulnerable seniors and families reach their potential.”

Catholic Social Services works to achieve this mission through a variety of services and locations across Central and Southern Ohio. They provide counseling and supportive services to families, a companion to seniors so they may keep their independence, supportive services to seniors, and many other services to the community members. These services are able to be provided through the efforts of donors and supporters of the organization.

The Spirit of Hope Gala is one of the organization’s annual fundraiser that brings people together to support the various causes and services Catholic Social Services provides. It will be held at the Columbus Museum of Art on March 5, 2016. This is where the majority of my time and energy will be focused during my Fellowship. I will be working alongside the Director of Mission Advancement as well as the Development Manager to make this event a success. I have been working on organizing a list of businesses and supporters to be invited to join the event as well as comprising a list of possible auction item donors. I will continue to work on both of these efforts as well as other tasks as the Gala approaches.

I have enjoyed my time with the organization thus far and cannot wait to see what else is in store for me with this wonderful opportunity. It is rewarding to know that all of the efforts that are put into making this event a success have such a powerful impact on the over 11,000 people the organization serves throughout the year.

Danielle Francis

Hello! My name is AnnMarie Graham, I am a senior at The Ohio State University studying Public Affairs and International Studies, and much like a sunrise, my time as a Fundraising and Development Intern for Serving Our Neighbors Ministries is just beginning!

Serving Our Neighbors (SON) Ministries works “to build our Hilliard community while offering a hand up (not a hand out) to families facing the unique challenges of poverty.” In order to achieve this goal, the nonprofit hosts several initiatives, ranging from a free legal clinic to the Hilliard Free Summer Lunch Camp to a Family English as a Second Language (ESL) program. The Family ESL program has already had a profound impact on me and has made me extremely proud to be part of this organization. Serving 126 adults and their children from 22 different countries, it is the literal definition of organized chaos, but chaos that is producing a tangible effect in the Hilliard community. Despite the already impressive magnitude of the program, there is still an extensive waitlist. That’s where I come in.

Working with the Development and Communications Associate, as well as the CEO and founder, I am providing fundraising and development support for the organization. My main responsibility is working in conjunction with the Stewardship Committee to plan and execute the Open Your Heart Gala that will be taking place in April. Other tasks include assisting with the creation of communications materials and interactions with partners.

Every day I leave the office feeling extremely content and fulfilled; I am so appreciative of the chance to be creative and help make an impact within my community. Already, I have learned so much from a truly extraordinary team, and it’s only been a month! I cannot wait to see what the next five have in store.

“For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Galatians 5:14

Hello Readers,

My name is Taylor Weis, I am a senior at Ohio Wesleyan University. I am fortunate to be serving as the fundraising/development fellow for the Boys and Girls Clubs of Columbus. I have a history with the Boys and Girls Clubs (BGC) as I interned with BGC of Alachua County in Gainesville, Fl this past summer. As an intern I worked directly with the kids on a daily basis teaching fitness classes every morning, teaching the program SMART girls, coaching the baseball team, and many other fun activities. I had a wonderful experience there and really fell in love with the organization.

The Boys and Girls Clubs of Columbus provide affordable after school and summer programming to youth ages 6 through 18. Our Clubs offer a safe and positive environment for kids to spend non-school hours, and also provides various extra-curricular activities. Our mission statement is “To empower young people to reach their full potential as productive, caring and responsible citizens.”

As the fundraising/development fellow I will be working with the director of development, the CEO, and the board to set up the policies and plans behind their endowment fund. I spent my first few weeks learning in depth information and history about the Boys and Girls Club of America. I also spent time learning about Boys and Girls Club of Columbus in particular, through reading and interaction. I got the opportunity to visit and tour all seven of the Columbus Club locations, meet the Club staff, and interact with the kids. After the introduction phase I started intensive research regarding my project. Some of this research includes gift acceptance policies, investment policies, spending rules, and policies for accepting bequests.

I am very thankful for this promising opportunity to help develop such a substantial organization that makes a profound impact on youth in the Greater Columbus Community!

Stay tuned for more updates on my work and experience!

-Taylor Weis