Education & Youth Development

Summer Search is a 7-year mentorship program for promising students facing unjust obstacles. Students join the program in their sophomore year of high school and are supported through college or other post-secondary pursuits. We provide comprehensive support through one-on-one mentorship from trained staff, peer-led group mentorship, and summers of experiential learning, while also supporting young people to build a toolkit for navigating and challenging systemic barriers to higher education and career opportunities.

Since our founding in 1990, Summer Search has reached more than 6,500 young people and currently serves more than 3,600 high school and college students in five regions across the country – San Francisco Bay Area, New York City, Boston, Philadelphia, and Seattle. Our alumni become the kind of leaders our country needs — civic leaders, advocates, industry leaders, teachers, mothers and fathers. Their collective leadership ripples out into the community and future generations and contributes to a more equitable society.

At a time of growth and innovation, Summer Search NYC is seeking an Individual Giving Manager to manage and grow an existing portfolio of individual donors and family foundations capable of making five- to six-figure gifts. Reporting to the Director of Development and working closely with the Executive Director, this hire will join a close-knit 5-member development team, liaise with colleagues across Summer Search’s national network, play a meaningful role in growing Summer Search’s impact in New York City and nationwide.

Specifically, the Individual Giving Manager will:

• Manage and grow a portfolio of ~125 existing individual donors and family foundations, with a current annual revenue target of ~$750K, and contribute to the team’s overall success against a $4M annual revenue target.
• Identify, qualify, and cultivate individual donor prospects who are aligned with Summer Search’s growth plans and core values and have the capacity to make five- and six-figure gifts.
• Partner with leadership, board, staff, and alumni to ensure that the donor portfolio is engaged through a strategic mix of in-person meetings, events, student engagement opportunities, and personalized stewardship communications.
• Partner with the Director of Development and Development Coordinator to better segment our individual donor pipeline (including major giving, mid-level donors, and annual giving), identifying opportunities for cultivation across each segment.
• Leverage site and national leadership to execute major moves for each donor managing all preparation including research, strategy, agenda and materials.
• Build affinity for Summer Search through planning, organizing and attending regular roundtables for our donor, student and alumni communities to meet with each other.
• Utilize a “moves management” system for donors and prospects in Raiser’s Edge, ensuring that all touchpoints and projections for gifts are tracked with a high degree of timeliness and accuracy.
• Lead bi-weekly strategy sessions with the Executive Director and Director of Development.
• Support individual donor strategy as it relates to our annual signature fundraising event, including using the event as an opportunity to qualify new prospects for major gifts and to build volunteer leadership opportunities for existing major donors.
• Collaborate with development colleagues across Summer Search sites to share best practices and participate in network-wide initiatives as a representative for the NYC site, as needed.
• Represent Summer Search at strategic outreach opportunities, including meetings, conferences, and events to cultivate and manage relationships with individual donors.

WHO YOU ARE

• You are committed to Summer Search’s mission and values. You believe that all young people should have the opportunity to fulfill their potential. You thrive in an organization that values authenticity, relationships, well-being, learning, personal growth, and an unwavering commitment to racial equity and inclusion.
• You are an energetic development professional with a love of fundraising. You bring 5+ years of work experience in development, with demonstrated success and enthusiasm for advancing individual donor relationships through the cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship process, ideally toward gift sizes of five figures or greater. You are equally comfortable with donor-facing and behind-the-scenes fundraising work.
• You are an excellent task and project manager, with exceptional attention to detail. You succeed at managing multiple workstreams and motivating, coordinating, and directing others to stay on track. You possess eagle-eye attention to detail and a commitment to high quality work product.
• You are a thoughtful communicator and authentic relationship builder. You approach all interactions with a warm personality that demonstrates respect, empathy, and connection. You succeed in inspiring a variety of audiences and articulate the importance of an organization’s work in a concise and compelling manner.
• You are an resourceful, flexible, and willing team player. You bring a “get it done” attitude and thrive in a highly entrepreneurial and fast-paced environment. You see the big picture, anticipate problems, and address challenges.
• You are a tech savvy development operations expert. You understand the technical aspects of fund development, including donor qualification, portfolio management, and moves management. You bring competency in CRM databases (Raiser’s Edge NXT preferred) and Microsoft Office applications, with strong proficiency in PowerPoint, Excel, and Outlook.
• You are committed to diversity, equity, inclusion, and anti-racism. You are energized to join an organization that is on a journey toward becoming an anti-racist organization. You are committed to dismantling racism within yourself and your colleagues. You seek out opportunities to instill anti-racist principles into donor-facing work.