$10M donation early boost for Penn Nursing

The Annenberg Foundation's donation of $5 million to Penn's School of Nursing earlier this month jump-started what Dean Afaf Meleis said will be an intense fundraising campaign.

While the school's capital campaign -- intended to raise $60 million for student scholarships, research programs and the renovation of the Nursing Education Building -- will not officially start until November, Meleis said the gift has given it an early kickoff.

"The gift from Annenberg has given us a wonderful push," she said.

The Annenberg Foundation gave the money to aid in the renovation of the school's main building. The Nursing Education Building will be renamed after former Nursing Dean Claire Fagin.

Renovations to the first floor of the building were completed in October. The Annenberg gift is intended to pay for a second phase of construction -- to improve classroom and research space -- over the next few years.

And while the gift came early, Meleis said she thinks it will encourage others to give as well.

"The campaign is running slightly ahead of public launch," Meleis said. The Annenberg Foundation donation will provide the Nursing School "amazing momentum" in its upcoming campaign.

"Having Annenberg make such a gift leverages us with other institutions," Meleis added.

As Meleis plans to kick the campaign into high gear, she says staying in touch with alumni is key.

She also plans to reach out to "friends of the University who may or may not be alumni but are interested in the crisis in health care," she said, referring to a shortage of nurses. Donors "are realizing now that nurses are really visible and part of the solution."

Meleis said that in the last two years, the amount of pledged donations has doubled, a sign that donors now consider nursing "part of the solution."

Assistant Dean for Nursing Development and Alumni Relations Wylie Thomas called the upcoming campaign "the culmination of a lot of years of thinking, strategic planning and hard work."

Pedie Killebrew, who serves on the Board of Overseers for the Nursing School, suggested turning for donations to "people who have had a great experience with nursing, [with] someone who has saved their life ... and there are more of them out there than you would imagine."

The Nursing school also plans to cultivate relationships with less conventional donors, such as corporations and hospitals. According to Meleis and Thomas, there has been rise in scholarships from hospitals around the area that donate money for financial aid with the stipulation that the recipients must work at the hospital for a certain time.

"Many corporations are beginning to have a public consciousness, [a] social consciousness. Nurses are in the best position to translate that consciousness into programs that benefit the community. Everybody comes out a winner," Meleis said.

Thomas and Meleis recently returned from a trip to Florida, where they met with alumni and friends of the school in order to hear new strategies for fundraising. The people to whom they spoke emphasized "increasing the spectrum of connections" and "reaching out in coalitions and collaborations such as have never been forged before."

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