UH Foundation fund-raiser leaving for Harvard position
By Beverly Creamer
Advertiser Education Writer
On the verge of the biggest capital campaign in University of Hawai'i history, the president of its fund-raising arm is resigning.
Elizabeth "Betsy" Sloane will leave the University of Hawai'i Foundation by the end of March to join Harvard Divinity School as associate dean for development and alumni relations.
Sloane, 52, departs after a two-year tenure that saw fund raising grow by 22.6 percent last year and 19 percent so far this year, and the endowment return to its pre-Sept. 11 peak of $113.5 million after a loss of $25.9 million after the terrorist attacks.
But she also butted heads with the legislative auditor over the release of foundation records. In that dispute the two parties have agreed that donor names will be protected as the foundation demanded.
Sloane's departure was almost a given after the December action by the Board of Regents in not renewing the contract of her husband, J.R.W. "Wick" Sloane, the university's chief financial officer. His contract expires in December.
"It's a unique offer and closely aligned with my education and my professional experience and my interests in terms of the larger questions we're dealing with in the world today," said Elizabeth Sloane, who has a Master's of Divinity from Yale University Divinity School. "It would be very hard to turn it down. We knew we would need to be exploring opportunities here and on the Mainland, but this came up very quickly and unexpectedly."
Sloane is the third person linked closely to UH President Evan Dobelle to be moving on. Her position with the foundation has been a wedge for Dobelle critics, who have cited the Sloanes and Paul Costello as examples of hiring friends or former associates at big salaries.
Costello, former vice president for external affairs, took a job at the Stanford University School of Medicine in January. Costello and Dobelle had worked together 20 years ago in the Carter White House.
Both Dobelle and Howard Karr, UH Foundation board chairman, praised Sloane's accomplishments and expressed sorrow at her departure.
"Under Betsy's leadership the foundation is well-positioned to generate increased private support, which is critical as we endeavor to achieve a world-class system of higher education in Hawai'i," said Karr, praising the team-building that has occurred under Sloane.
Dobelle said Harvard's decision to hire Sloane "speaks volumes of her talent and accomplishments."
Sloane's departure comes just as the foundation is kicking off the 18-month "quiet phase" of its Centennial Campaign, which hopes to raise up to $250 million by 2007 for university programs and expansion.
Sloane doesn't want her departure to hamper the success of the coming campaign and points to Donna Vuchinich, vice president for development, and Bill King, foundation chief financial officer, as strong members of the management team who will continue to move forward.
Vuchinich has been named acting president replacing Sloane. Vuchinich came to the UH Foundation from Oregon State University Foundation and has 20 years of experience in public university fund raising, including playing a lead role in the $100 million capital campaign for the University of New Mexico in 1989.
Sloane came to the foundation partly on the recommendation of Dobelle, with whom she had worked as a fund-raiser at Trinity College in Hartford, Conn., where she increased fund raising by more than 500 percent.
The UH Foundation has raised $53.2 million in the past 2 1/2 years and more than $18.2 million in the first eight months of the current fiscal year.
The university's endowment, which is $113.5 million, is expected to grow to $184 million by the end of the Centennial Campaign. Money raised will be directed to a variety of projects on every campus, including financing a new Cancer Research Center in Kaka'ako next to the new John A. Burns School of Medicine under construction and scheduled to be open next fall.
Sloane officially joins Harvard on April 1.
Reach Beverly Creamer at bcreamer@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8013.
