University Advancement

What Advancement does

University Advancement raises private money for Porter and keeps its graduates connected to it. The division is led by Hollis Vang, vice chancellor for university advancement, who also serves as executive director of the UW–Porter Falls Foundation, the separate nonprofit that receives and holds every gift. Advancement and the Foundation share the second floor of the Welcome Center, the 1911 rail depot on Founders Drive.

The Foundation and the campaign

The Foundation is governed by its own 24-member volunteer board and audited independently every year; that separation is what lets a donor give to nursing scholarships and know the gift cannot be moved to cover a budget gap. In fiscal 2026 it received $6.4 million in gifts from 5,180 donors and transferred $5.1 million to the university for scholarships, equipment and programs.

The current campaign, “Built for Work,” has a $42 million goal for three things: the advanced manufacturing and robotics lab, the Halvorsen Library 24-hour study addition, and permanent need-based scholarship endowment. As of September 30, 2026, it stood at $29.6 million, or 70 percent. Naming levels are on capital campaign and naming opportunities; current funding priorities are on giving priorities.

Ironclad Giving Day

Ironclad Giving Day runs for 1,893 minutes — one for each year since the Porter Manual Training School opened — starting at midnight on Tuesday, April 6, 2027, and ending at 7:33 a.m. on Wednesday. Colleges, teams, ensembles and student organizations each get a page and compete on a live leaderboard for bonus challenge dollars put up by alumni.

• 2026 results: 3,947 donors and $1,184,320, including challenge matches (the results story).
• 2027 goal: 2,500 donors. The goal is counted in people, not dollars, on purpose.
• Most-funded fund last year: the student emergency fund, followed by Ironclad wrestling and the Baja and Formula Solar teams.

Any gift, any day, goes through the give page.

Alumni relations

Porter has about 52,000 living alumni, roughly 40 percent of them within 75 miles of Porter Falls. Alumni Relations runs Millrace Week (October homecoming), regional chapters in Lake City, the Cities and four other metro areas (find a chapter), the alumni mentor network and the Ring of Iron ceremony for seniors. Graduates keep library borrowing privileges and an @uwporterfalls.edu forwarding address. Updates and class notes go to Porter Falls Magazine; everything else alumni-related starts at alumni.

For donors: the practical part

Every gift gets a receipt within five business days. Gifts of stock, IRA distributions, donor-advised fund grants and bequests are handled by the development staff, who do not work on commission; ask for planned giving if you are naming Porter in a will. Donor names are not sold or traded, and anyone can ask to be removed from solicitations by email.

You can direct a gift to almost anything with an account: a college, a team, an ensemble, a named scholarship, the student emergency fund. Restricted gifts are spent only on what the donor named, and the Foundation reports back each fall on how the money was used. Unrestricted gifts go to the Chancellor’s Fund for Excellence, which last year paid for 41 student conference trips and the first year of the expanded paid co-op stipends. Employer matching gifts double a surprising number of donations; check with your employer before you give.

Faculty and staff who want to raise money for a project should talk to Development before asking anyone outside the university — partly so two people do not ask the same donor in the same month, and partly because the development officers usually know who has already said no.