Fresno State Athletics
California State University, Fresno: The National Development Council
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FRESNO, Calif. - Fresno State has chartered a direction for the next five years that calls for the institution to enhance its strong reputation for a quality undergraduate education, with regional and national reputations in selected areas. If the University is to achieve its goals and remain competitive in the next century, members of the University community, our alumni and friends must share a common vision for what is needed and what can be accomplished.
The University cannot realize this vision for the future without the help of committed alumni and friends. It is because Fresno State faces opportunities and challenges that the National Development Council is being established. The Council will serve as a mechanism for involving the talent and influence of prominent volunteers who will make a difference at the University by contributing their efforts to make Fresno State a better place.
The National Development Council will play a critical and highly visible role in bringing these projects and goals to fruition. Members of the National Development Council will be asked to do the following:
- Provide advice on the essential elements of Fresno State's strategic planning documents.
- Actively participate in the major fundraising initiatives the University will launch in the coming years.
- Volunteer to constructively utilize their talents and contacts to participate in individual, corporate/foundation cultivation and solicitation activities.
- Assist in the recruitment of volunteers for the University.
- Provide leadership in raising the membership of the President's Circle to 1,000 members by the year 2001.
- Actively support the development of the Pinnacle Society, the University's premier cumulative lifetime giving club.
- Participate in feasibility studies for major capital campaigns.
- Use their homes, clubs and offices to host small group meetings of Fresno State alumni and friends.
- Assist in the recruitment of the best and the brightest students in the West to attend Fresno State.
- Provide advice on seeking the highest level of government support for higher education and Fresno State from both Sacramento and Washington.
Council members will provide a wide range of their expertise to this institution. University outreach occurs on a number of key levels. The National Development Council would have an impact on all levels. As the organization's name would suggest, members offer counsel to the University's President, his cabinet members and members of the University Advancement staff.
Members also lend their expertise from across the United States nd abroad. They provide general counsel for and links to the corporate sector, and to national and regional foundations. They serve as ambassadors to governmental agencies both in Sacramento and Washington.
Their primary function will be in their own geographic location and within their own professional fields of expertise or areas of personal expertise or interest. They represent satellites of the University and a presence for out institution, often in distant locations.
The Council will be divided into four basic categories: (1) the National Executive Committee; (2) the Regional Resource Committee; (3) Governmental Affairs Committee; (4) and Student Recruitment Committee. All four committees will be organized under the leadership of a general chairman and the council will meet once a year in Fresno under the direction of that chairman. Regional Resources members will also meet on an ongoing basis in their respective geographical locations.
Development Council members include: Ezunial Burts, President, Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce; Sam Iacobellis, Executive Vice President (retired), Rockwell International; Virgil Rose, President, Rose Consulting; Dr. Sid Craig, President, Sid and Jenny Craig Foundation; Richard Johanson, Chariman, Johanson Transportation Services; Vinci Richiutti, PR-Farms; Larry Dickenson, Senior VP, Boeing; Milo Medin, Senior Vice President, @ Home Network; Max Shuster, President, Shuster Insurance Services, Inc.; Dr. Bob Duncan, Chairman, Duncan Enterprises/Duncan Financial; Paul O'Neill, Chairman and CEO, Aluminum Company of America; Jan Yanehiro, television broadcaster, Jan Yanehiro Inc.; Ed Gray, retired President and CEO/cabinet member to President Ronald Reagan; Dr. Gordon Rausser, Dean, School of Natural Resources, University of California, Berkeley.