Making the Case for Arts and Sciences 105 how to approach them. As noted by Danilowicz and Hayes in Chapter 3, “You are the chief academic officer for the college, which means your development officer will rely on you [and participating faculty] to be able to communicate (in lay terms) the academic vision of the college and its potential programs to potential donors.” And in Chapter 4, Trela, Finkelstein and Vermeulen list six appropriate “steps to finding friends and raising money.” Your development officer is critical to this process, since he/she will usually have a list of prospective donors that may have an interest in your project. In other cases, your officer will create a list of prospective donors through research or by consulting friends of the college. Your development officer may also make initial contact with prospective donors. Selling your college’s vision to donors is grounded on two main strategies: planning and relationship building. Referring to the ideas that had been proposed by alumni, described above, (PSG) The endowed speaker’s series at CMU and its initial $500,000 endowment came together within a six-month period. After the donor came to us with the idea for such a series—and we clarified what we could accomplish through such a series—my development officer and I met with both politicians’ families to seek their approval and support. Once we had their permission to move forward, the campaign accelerated and we were able to identify major donors who, while not all alumni of our University, believed in the value and purpose of the project. (We were also fortunate to be able to take advantage of a University match on the payout if we were able to reach the projected goal by the end of the year— which we did.) It was intensive work, but one that has paid off for our students, faculty, and community by having the ability to bring key political figures to campus to speak. (DB) The STEM priority at UNO was initiated by a donor who established two $1-million Community Chairs—one in the College of Education and one in the Department of