by Caleb Fort
Daily Lobo
Add fundraising to the list of adrenaline-fueled activities alongside skydiving and rollercoasters.
"I love what I do," said Pam Hurd-Knief, associate vice president for development. "Some people might be scared about asking for money like that, but it's actually a euphoric feeling when they say, 'I can do that.' I can't explain it - the rush
you get."
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With $56.8 million raised this year, the UNM Foundation has until July 1 to meet its goal of $61 million, she said.
The foundation is a nonprofit organization dedicated to raising private gifts for the University.
"We had a couple of discussions in early June where we were like, 'Are we going to be able to meet this goal?'" she said. "I have a very good feeling now that we're going to be able to
do it."
Of the amount raised this year, $18.5 million came from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, an organization that tries to improve health care, to start a national center for health policy.
Such large gifts have to become commonplace for the foundation to meet its next goal, she said.
"That wasn't an anomaly," Hurd-Knief said. "That is something we're going to have to do again and do it more often."
She said the goal for 2007-08 will be higher than $61 million, but she was not sure by
how much.
The foundation is in meetings to set its goal for next year and should have a final number by the end of June, she said.
"If you were to say, 'Pam, do you know where it's all going to come from?' I'd say, 'No, not really,'" she said. "We have a good idea about a lot of things, but at the end of the day, you can't plan gifts. You don't know when somebody's going to back out, and you don't know if somebody's going to die and leave money for the University."
Getting money isn't just a matter of asking, she said.
"When we first sit down, it's not about money," she said. "We ask them, 'What would you have wanted at UNM when you went there?' If they wanted more scholarships, that's a potential gift. If they say they wanted more traveling professors, that's another one."
Although big gifts are needed to reach the foundation's goals, Hurd-Knief said small gifts are also important.
"They build up pretty fast," she said. "For a lot of people, that's how they enter into giving. The person who starts out giving $25 a year might get some money later on, and they're already thinking of us. Paying attention to the little gifts is very, very important."
To meet next year's goal, the foundation needs to go after "stretch gifts," she said.
"That's the kind of thing where you have to go home and talk to your wife about it," she said. "It's one of those things that makes you go, 'Whoa.' One of the most magical things is when you ask someone for this big amount of money - six figures, where you have to suck in your breath before you say it - and they pull out a checkbook in front of you."
Getting such gifts for UNM is not difficult, she said.
"We have this big institution where all this stuff goes on," she said. "There's something everyone can care about. The University is not a hard sell. We would not be getting this money if
it was."
Source of 2005-06 gifts
Other organizations: $11.54 million
Corporations: $10.88 million
Foundations: $10.59 million
Individuals: $8.94 million
Alumni: $6.61 million
Total: $48.56 million
Source: UNM Foundation Report for Giving
