Meg Houston Maker, Conference Chair
Director, External Information Services
Dartmouth College

Meg Houston Maker is the director of external information services for Dartmouth College development, where she oversees Web strategy for fundraising. At Dartmouth, she has designed the interactive marketing programs for both annual fund and campaign priorities, helping the institution achieve its first-place national standing for per-alum online fundraising.

Maker has 18 years' experience in software design and interactive product management, having served clients including CNN, National Geographic, The Image Bank, ABC News, and the Associated Press. She is a frequent lecturer on user-centered design and the effective use of technology in online communications. She writes about experience design and digital culture at www.engagingexperience.com.

A summa cum laude graduate of Dartmouth College, Maker is currently pursuing her master's degree in creative writing at her alma mater.

Dan Allenby
Director of Annual Giving Strategy & Operations
Tufts University

Dan Allenby has over 15 years of experience in development and marketing. He is currently the director of annual giving strategy & operations at Tufts University and has previously held positions at Boston College, Georgetown University, National Geographic and American University.

He hosts a blog called Ideas for Annual Giving at http://danallenby.com/ and is the founder of The Annual Giving Exchange, an online community in Linked-in where hundreds of annual giving professionals network and share best practices.

Allenby holds an master's degree in business administration from Boston College, a bachelor's degree from James Madison University, and is certified by Tufts University in the Management of Community Organizations. He is a frequent speaker for the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) and has consulted with numerous nonprofit organizations.

Beth Gardner Braxton
Director of Annual Giving
University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill

Elizabeth Braxton is the director of annual giving at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The Carolina Annual Fund has grown 41 percent in dollars under her leadership and has had an increase in alumni donors in the previous two fiscal years.

Braxton began her career in fundraising with the March of Dimes Birth Defects Foundation and Hospice of Winston-Salem. Since then she has worked for Weyerhaeuser; raised money for community hospitals; served as director of alumni campaigns for UNC's Medical Foundation of North Carolina; and as director of major gifts for Kenan-Flagler Business School. In February 2002, she became assistant dean of development and alumni affairs at the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at UNC and assumed her current position in November 2003.

Braxton graduated from UNC in 1990 with a bachelor’s degree in journalism.

Julie Chiron
Fundraising Campaign Web Manager
University of California, Berkeley

Julie Chiron is the Web manager for campaign and online giving activities at UC Berkeley, which is ranked 6th by the Chronicle of Philanthropy in online fundraising among universities nationwide.

Prior to her seven years in advancement marketing at Berkeley, she owned a Web services company that developed social media tools for online retailers such as Sony and Cooking.com. She began her career in interactive media as a founder of WIRED magazine's online division, HotWired, and has worked at several interactive design agencies in the Bay Area.

Speaker

Robert Weiner
President
Robert L. Weiner Consulting

Robert Weiner is an independent consultant who specializes in helping fundraisers make informed, strategic decisions about information technology and advancement services. His higher education clients have included UC Berkeley, the Florida State University Foundation, Santa Clara University, Sonoma State, San Jose State, California State University East Bay and CSU Dominguez Hills, Pomona College, the University of Montana Foundation and Reed College.

Other clients have included Greenpeace International, the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, Earthjustice, the Trust for Public Land, EMILY's List and Mothers Against Drunk Driving.