Volume CXXXIII, Number 6 October 19, 2001 f

Alum to run annual giving
COURTESY OF THE OFFICE OF COMMUNICATIONS

Susan Lyons of Cambridge, Mass., was recently appointed director of annual giving at Bowdoin College. Lyons, who will take up her duties on November 21, is currently the deputy director of the Harvard College Fund at Harvard University.

A 1989 Bowdoin graduate, Lyons will have overall responsibility for the organization, planning, and management of the College's program to seek annual gifts from alumni and friends. Bowdoin's annual giving program raises over $7 million each year.

She succeeds Elizabeth D. Orlic, who has directed the annual giving program at Bowdoin for the past three years. Orlic, who led the Alumni Fund to its most successful year ever for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2001, has been named to a new post as a senior capital support officer at the College.

"Susan Lyons is a highly talented development officer who has an outstanding track record of accomplishment at the Harvard Alumni fund," said William Torrey, Bowdoin's vice president for planning and development. "We're delighted that she is returning to Bowdoin in this important position to direct our Annual Giving program, and I very much look forward to working with her."

In addition to supervising the Alumni Fund, the Friends of the College Fund, and the Polar Bear Athletic Fund, Lyons will work with the director of parent giving and play a key role in the development of comprehensive strategies for all aspects of the College's fundraising programs.

Lyons has been a member of the Harvard College Fund staff since 1991, most recently collaborating with the executive director and senior staff on the strategic planning and direction of reunion and non-reunion fundraising for Harvard's $75 million annual fund.

She served as campaign director for the 25th Reunion Gift for the Harvard class of 1976-Harvard's first co-ed class, which raised over $25 million with a record-breaking participation rate of 70%.

At Harvard she also served as west coast regional director and associate director of the Fund, and hosted travel study programs to Greece, Turkey, and the Yangtze River in China.

Lyons earned her master of theological studies degree at the Harvard Divinity School in 1992 and is enrolled in a certificate program in business and administration at the Harvard Extension School.

A native of Dyer Brook, Maine, she is a 1985 graduate of Southern Aroostook Community High School. She graduated with honors from Bowdoin in 1989, with a degree in philosophy.