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Challenges Persist After $1 Billion Campaign-Porterfield Attracting Investors
As part of the program, more than 85 students work as part of a phonathon, calling alumni, parents and friends of the university. This year’s callers had already raised more than $1 million by November 2003, less than halfway through the current fiscal year.
One SFS senior, who worked at the phonathon from 2000-3, remarked that the program suffers from inadequate supervision and training. Because the bonus structure favors total number of pledges and the number of credit card donations as opposed to the value of donations, he said that too often student callers work toward gaining more pledges for smaller amounts of money rather than going for fewer large pledges.
“We are rational actors, and we want the bonus. So if the bonus is based on the total number of pledges or on the number of credit card sales, we’ll go after that, rather than trying to get the largest pledge possible.”
Jill Dmohowski (COL ’04), however, finds the phonathon to be a great working environment. “It’s a very friendly atmosphere,” she said. Each week, from Sunday to Thursday, students call prospective donors from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. “We target all kinds of different calling pools – reunion years, parents of current students, parents of former students or recent alumni,” she explained.
As the year progresses, she said students hit “the bottom of the calling pool,” so it becomes more difficult to raise money.
Dmohowski said that callers must always expect the unexpected. “Some people are willing to talk to you, others have a million reasons why they won’t give,” she explained.