Pam Russell
director of communications
CASE
+1-202-478-5680
russell@case.org

For Immediate Release
March 29, 2011

CASE, Commonfund Name 2011 IRF Award Recipients

Great Basin College, University of New Mexico Foundation Leaders to be Honored at IRF Conference

WASHINGTON, D.C.—A chief financial officer who helped fuel extraordinary growth at a small, rural foundation and a senior leader who helped build two young foundations into high-performing organizations are the 2011 recipients of the CASE Commonfund Institutionally Related Foundation awards.

The IRF awards recognize individuals who have made extraordinary contributions to the advancement, quality and effectiveness of their foundations and the community of institutionally related foundations as a whole. Institutionally related foundations are private, nonprofit corporations that cultivate and manage private resources to support the missions of the colleges, universities and university systems with which they are affiliated.

The 2011 recipients are:

Lisa Heise, controller, Great Basin College Foundation. Heise has extensive experience in all aspects of exempt organization accounting and reporting. During her nine-year tenure with the foundation, she has implemented best practices in fiscal matters, board relations and donor stewardship that have helped grow its assets and reputation with its college, community and the Nevada System of Higher Education. Heise's leadership in these and other areas helped move the organization into the ranks of the most successful small college foundations in the country. Beyond her work at the Great Basin College Foundation, Heise is actively involved with the institutionally related foundation community and has been a regular contributor to the field. In addition to being a frequent speaker at regional and national conferences, Heise successfully advocated for a biennial audit review policy with her state's board of regents, a step that will result in considerable savings for small foundations.

John Stropp, former president of the University of New Mexico Foundation. Stropp is a nationally recognized leader among institutionally related foundations with more than 25 years of experience at Texas A&M Foundation (1984-2008) and the University of New Mexico Foundation (2008-2010). During his tenure as vice president of finance and administration at Texas A&M Foundation, Stropp oversaw growth in assets from $70 million to more than $1 billion and was actively involved in two major campaigns that raised more than $1.5 billion. Stropp also served as interim president of the Texas A&M Foundation during the 2007 fiscal year. As president and chief executive officer of the University of New Mexico Foundation, Stropp oversaw the transition of all development-related and asset management services from the university to a separate, independent foundation. He also prepared the foundation and university to launch a major campaign, which raised a record $95 million in the 2009 fiscal year, and announced the public phase of an eight-year, $675 million capital campaign. Stropp is an active member of CASE and a past chair of the CASE National Committee for Institutionally Related Foundations.

CASE and Commonfund will recognize Heise and Stropp during an awards luncheon April 13 at the 19^th Annual Conference for Institutionally Related Foundations in Phoenix, Ariz.

The awards are underwritten by Commonfund, a nonprofit corporation that provides fund management services and investment advice to educational institutions, hospitals, foundations, and other nonprofits.

About CASE

The Council for Advancement and Support of Education is a professional association serving educational institutions and the advancement professionals who work on their behalf in alumni relations, communications, development, marketing and allied areas.

CASE was founded in 1974 and maintains headquarters in Washington, D.C., with offices in London (CASE Europe, 1994), Singapore (CASE Asia-Pacific, 2007) and Mexico City (CASE América Latina, 2011).

Today, CASE’s membership includes more than 3,600 colleges and universities, primary and secondary independent and international schools, and nonprofit organizations in 76 countries around the globe. This makes CASE one of the world’s largest nonprofit educational associations in terms of institutional membership. CASE serves more than 70,000 advancement professionals on the staffs of its member institutions and has more than 17,000 professional members on its roster.

To fulfill their missions and to meet both individual and societal needs, colleges, universities and independent schools rely on—and therefore must foster—the good will, active involvement, informed advocacy and enduring support of alumni, donors, prospective students, parents, government officials, community leaders, corporate executives, foundation officers and other external constituencies.

CASE helps its members build stronger relationships with all of these constituencies by providing relevant research, supporting growth in the profession and fostering support of education. CASE also offers a variety of advancement products and services, provides standards and an ethical framework for the profession and works with other organizations to respond to public issues of concern while promoting the importance of education worldwide.

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