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Pioneering Spirit

Building Fund Drive Leaders Count on Fellow Alums to Help Make SOM Great

By Paula Felps

Tones of quiet excitement edge into their voices as they speak of the 
focal point The UTD School of Management (SOM) building will bring for 
alums and current students alike. They see it as a source of pride, a 
chance to build something important in the pioneering spirit of North 
Texas's early settlers.

These are the reasons that SOM alums Mike Inman, EMBA '95, and Sean 
McNeill, EMBA '99, have agreed to volunteer for leadership positions in 
the Building for the Future fund drive to make the School's new building a 
reality. These particular leaders and representatives from each of SOM's 
seven other Executive MBA graduating classes will spearhead fundraising 
efforts among their fellow classmates. The drive, which will kick off in 
June, challenges each of the EMBA alumni classes to one hundred percent 
participation.

"The School of Management is at a critical point in its history," Mr. 
Inman says. "It has grown fast and is [now] accredited (see SOM Earns 
Accreditation on page 11); there's a lot going on there. I think [the 
building fund] is a great opportunity for alumni to see it grow. It's 
going no place but up."

Mr. McNeill agrees. "This is much like the people who originally lived in 
these parts. They would help each other raise a barn or build a church for 
the good of everyone in the community. They would label the cornerstone 
with something significant about the people who helped. They input value 
in the effort through their participation."

The fund drive offers different levels of giving. Alumni can sponsor or 
"buy" a brick bearing their name for a one-thousand-dollar contribution, 
or they can have their name engraved on a brass plaque for a five-
thousand-dollar gift. Both the bricks and the plaques will be prominently 
displayed inside the building.

"The bricks are like individual cornerstones. . . our way to say we've 
lived here and worked here, and there is value here," says Mr. McNeill, 
who is responsible for product marketing at AMX Corporation in Richardson. 
AMX sells residential and commercial high-tech control systems.

The SOM also is looking to alums to enhance that value by giving larger 
gifts. Top-level donors will have the opportunity to name classrooms and 
other public spaces in the new building.

Heading into June, the School is particularly grateful to its Leadership 
Alumni, not only exemplary SOM graduates but also other volunteers. 
Besides leading solicitation efforts, this group has shown high-level 
commitment by generously providing large individual gifts of their own to 
the drive.

A key factor in being a nationally recognized university and management 
school is a high level of continuing alumni participation in fundraising, 
Dr. Diane Seay McNulty, SOM's associate dean for external affairs and 
corporate development, believes. Just as the School has consistently 
improved the quality of its programs as part of its efforts to achieve 
national prominence, administrators hope alumni giving, too, will improve 
in a demonstration of graduates' ongoing pride and belief in their SOM 
education, Dr. McNulty says.

Mr. Inman, who is a managing director of Carreker Corporation, which 
provides software and consulting to the financial industry both in the 
United States and internationally, also stresses the multiple advantages 
of high level alumni participation in the building fund drive. The 
distinction between "average" and "great" universities is participation 
from alums, he says.

"The bottom line is, this participation can only help. Additional alumni 
support is important for the [School's] ranking and the quality of people 
it attracts," as well as for the building fund. "This is something that 
everyone benefits from."