Overview
Reading Partners is changing the education landscape. We are a leader in working to solve the literacy crisis in our country by leveraging community volunteers in under-resourced schools. Our diverse and expansive volunteer base provides one-on-one tutoring to students twice weekly, and our program is proven to help children master the reading fundamentals they need to unlock their potential as successful, happy and confident readers in school and in life. Our people are our heartbeat and our greatest resource; we are all passionately rallied around our mission to help children become lifelong learners by empowering communities to provide individualized instruction that works. Join our stellar team leading the charge to deepen our impact and expand our service. Watch this video to learn more about Reading Partners.
The high level:
The Development Associate (DA) is part of a team of relationship builders working together to support Reading Partners’ strategic growth plan through fundraising and streamlined development operations. The Development Associate’s main role is to support the achievement of regional fundraising goal in close partnership with the local development team by driving development operations. Reporting directly to the Senior Development Operations Manager, the Development Associate supports a variety of development team initiatives, is heavily involved in prospecting, research, grant writing, and event support, and ensures smooth departmental operations. The Development Associate may manage a small portfolio of relationships. The Development Associate is a highly collaborative, detail-oriented, and avid relationship builder who is hungry to gain a great deal of exposure to many areas of fundraising in a high growth nonprofit.
What you’ll do:
Drive regional development operations and provide administrative support by…
- Supporting with gift processing and donor stewardship, such as sending tax receipts and thank you cards/emails.
- Overseeing and leveraging Salesforce donor database to record and track deadlines, meeting notes, and funder information.
- Producing reports and data that are used by the development team and Executive Director to drive streamlined communication internally and with board.
Support all external revenue activities to meet or exceed ambitious fundraising goals for the entire region.
- Support writing for fundraising and external relations activities for the region including meeting briefs, letters, follow-up correspondence, updates, acknowledgements, reports, grants, proposals, newsletters, and more.
- Support with development logistics in activities and campaigns, such as the end-of-year annual fundraising appeal, the annual gala, and corporate engagement events.
- Conduct a high volume of prospect research to identify and qualify foundation, corporate, and major gift prospects.
- Support all shared development team responsibilities including board and committee meetings, annual mailings, site visits, etc.
Other duties as needed.
How you’ll do it:
Development Operations Management:
- Demonstrate a growing ability to conduct research, to prospect, and to drive ongoing development efforts in rapidly growing organizations particularly in the San Francisco Bay Area.
- Lead on high volume of operational needs for the development department including grant writing, meeting brief creation, donor cultivation tracking, event planning, prospect research, and data aggregation. Manage data entry in Salesforce for dozens of accounts.
- Demonstrate a strong detail orientation, a strong drive for accuracy, and ability manage projects independently, and as part of a team. Execute all work in a highly organized, analytical, and data driven manner. Demonstrate the ability to prioritize, problem solve
Relationship Development & Collaboration:
- Establish highly collaborative relationships with all team members in the region. Work closely with portfolio managers to ensure accurate, timely and compelling interactions with donors. Work closely with the national accounting team on grants management and reporting.
- Demonstrate a hunger to learn, grow, support, and add great value. Regularly seek to understand all aspects of our model to convey externally. Boast an entrepreneurial spirit and actively seek to deepen current donor relationships and forge new ones. Demonstrate excitement to steward and leverage relationships to support regional growth.
Communication:
- Effectively write high-quality donor communications that demonstrate deep knowledge of our program and promote our mission. Demonstrate the ability to write customized and compelling grant reports, proposals and letters of intent. Through exceptional writing, serve as an ambassador of Reading Partners.
- Quickly establish credibility when promoting Reading Partners to external audiences. Demonstrate a high degree of comfort and poise with donors, corporations, and prospects.
About you!
You’ll be successful in this role if you:
- You have 1+ years of increasing responsibility in a development or related role
- Are an exceptional, persuasive and persistent communicator in writing and verbally
- Are achievement-oriented
- Excellent attention to detail and project management skills
- Have a high degree of comfort with Salesforce or other fundraising databases
- Demonstrate a deep belief in our mission, and commitment to race, equity, diversity, and inclusion, and root your work in our core values
- Ability to prove eligibility to work legally in the U.S.
Bonus Points if you:
- Have experience working in the launch phase of projects or programs
- Are an AmeriCorps, Peace Corps, or other national service alum/alumna