Pilots Give 2018

Tomorrow and Thursday are the first annual Pilots Give event days.  This is a focused attempt to raise money and connect with donors in 24 hours, with competitions where different schools, programs and groups on campus can compete for addition prize donations.

From the UP FAQ:

Pilots Give is the University of Portland's first-ever day of giving. During the 24-hour push, Pilots will inspire other Pilots to give back and show our Pilot Pride Worldwide!

This is our chance to make UP stronger and give thanks for the impact UP has had in our lives, our families, and the world around us. When we give together, the collective impact of our generosity inspires others to join in and give back too!

Plan to give through the campaigns on the home page on April 4-5 and you will be counted toward challenges that will release bonus dollars for University programs. Your gift can help your favorite campaign win $5,000 or more in bonus funds through the Grand, Academic, and Athletic Challenges!

YOU are the most important part of #PilotsGive! Our goal is 1000 donors in 24 hours.  That's a lot of generosity! You can help spread the word through social media with our toolkit and by joining our Facebook event!

Every donation of every size counts toward the challenge goals. We are encouraging people to give $20.18 to celebrate the Senior Class!

To help us reach our ambitious goal of 1000 gifts in 24 hours a number of donors have offered challenge funds that will be released when we meet our goal. Find out how you can help your favorite campaign win additional funds here: https://pilotsgive.up.edu/pages/events-and-challenges

This is a great opportunity to give to the U, and specifically help the program of your choice... not to mention have a little fun along the way.  Check out the U's Pilots Give website here: LINK.  Note that the request amount to donate is only $20.18.  

Of special note on this site is the $10,000 Athletics Challenge: $10,000 Athletics Challenge to the TOP THREE Varsity teams from UP Board of Regent, Steve Shepard '58.  First Place: $5,000, Second Place: $3,000, Third Place: $1,000.  This is a good opportunity to get some additional dollars for the basketball program!

It looks like the site linked above has a live leaderboard and a schedule of events, including a parade to kick things off at noon on Wednesday.  I see a tap take over in the Pilot House, and a live Portside broadcast as well...

PilotNut wrote:Every donation of every size counts toward the challenge goals. We are encouraging people to give $20.18 to celebrate the Senior Class!

To help us reach our ambitious goal of 1000 gifts in 24 hours a number of donors have offered challenge funds that will be released when we meet our goal. Find out how you can help your favorite campaign win additional funds here: https://pilotsgive.up.edu/pages/events-and-challenges.

Remember, it is the number of gifts, not the amount of the gifts that will release additional funds.  To make the numbers go up, consider giving multiple small gifts from your household instead of one larger gift....this is what Mrs. DD and I will be doing, each of us will give a separate gift!

Good clarification, DD! Give early and give often!

There will be doughnuts on Thursday. Student Pilot, you will have to eat them for all of us!

PilotNut wrote:Good clarification, DD!  Give early and give often!  

Um, I should probably clarify the clarification.

I misspoke in my original post, it's not the number of donations that could trigger the release of an additional $400,000, but it's the number of people who donate.

....don't give often, but remind others to give so we have over 1,000 people make donations!

Good start, everyone!

Over 60 donors to UP Athletics and over $6,000 donated in the first hour.

Remember, it's not about the amount, but it's about how many people donate!

Here's a link to the scoreboard:
https://pilotsgive.up.edu/pages/home-23

After 90 minutes the Women's Soccer Team is way ahead in number of donors with 47.

Men's Basketball has 2.

https://pilotsgive.up.edu/pages/leaderboard-16

PilotNut wrote:There will be doughnuts on Thursday.  Student Pilot, you will have to eat them for all of us!

I heard about the doughnuts, but not sure they'll let us skip class to eat doughnuts.....

Didn't see the parade today, but we all heard it because it was being led by the Villa Drum Squad.  Apparently it was students, staff, and alumni marching around campus "drumming-up" support for Pilots Give!

I didn't give a lot, just an hour's wage from my after school job, but I know that I'll be one of the donors that will help us reach 1,000 donors and unlock the nearly $400,000 in extra money for UP.

I just made my donation. Let's get everyone to join in and help us win some challenge money! Our basketball program needs it!

Profet wrote:I just made my donation.  Let's get everyone to join in and help us win some challenge money!  Our basketball program needs it!

Thank you, and Welcome to Pilot Nation!

I have made a donation as well. Let's get the men's hoops numbers up!

Tonight's Portside with the Pilots was fantastic... it was a Pilots Give theme, with interviews with Scott Leykam, Terry Porter, Nick Carlin-Voigt, Rob Conner, Geoff Loomis, Cheryl Sorenson, Ian Solof, Jeff Baxter, Matt Coffey (MSOC), Jelena Lukic (WTEN), Melissa Gomez (WROW),  Michail Pervolarakis (MTEN).

This is a long episode, but please take time for these show.  The replay from the live Facebook broadcast is here: https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10156796218602784&id=93885717783

Note that the episode that airs on CSNNW is an abbreviated version.

Please consider a small donation to the U before noon tomorrow at pilotsgive.up.edu.  Please check out the website even if you do not donate... it's good stuff!

.....and Frenchie explaining how the Women's Soccer Special Fund is well ahead of the other funds because of the work of the Women's Soccer alumni network and the current players getting the word out.

She also said she's told her supporters that it may be "3-0 at the half, but there's an entire second half yet to play." So don't let up now!

Current standings in terms of "supporters:"

1. Women's Soccer
2. Men's Tennis
3. Men's Soccer

I certainly watched her portion... not sure how I missed her!  You have to love the WSOC networking!

The coaches and players talked about what UP means to them, and what fans' support means to their programs.

It is also noted that the bonus money available to Athletics programs was doubled this evening! The number of donors stepping up seems to have far exceeded initial expectations, so the goal for the number of donations has been raised to 1901... we are already at 1642 as of now!!

PilotNut wrote:  The number of donors stepping up seems to have far exceeded initial expectations, so the goal for the number of donations has been raised to 1901... we are already at 1642 as of now!!

Two regents have stepped-up and pledged a combined $100,000 more if the new goal of 1901 total donors is achieved by noon on Thursday....a little over 12 hours from now. (As most know, 1901 is the year UP was founded).

Somehow, I think the Development folks are grinning ear-to-ear tonight.

We reached the 1901 goal! Now the top 5 athletic teams all get bonus gifts. Men's tennis is trying to give women's soccer a run for it's money right now.

Current standings with 3 hours left:
1. Women's Soccer - 264 - $8,000
2. Men's Tennis - 235 - $5,000
3. Men's Soccer - 165 - $4,000
4. Volleyball - 49 - $2,000
5. Men's Track and XC - 42 - $1,000
------
6. Baseball - 32

I have to feel for baseball right there in 6th. Coach Loomis posted on Twitter about it and said the money would go to the new Team Room. I like knowing the coaches plans for the funds (haven't been able to watch Portside to know if the other coaches discussed this).

We are over 2,180 donors... fantastic!  

Not surprisingly, Athletics has by far the most donors... but I am surprised at the margin:
Pilot Athletics: over 1,010 donors
Villa Maria Bishop Award Challenge: 153
School of Nursing: 123
CAS: 118 (but by far the largest in terms of dollars)
Campus Ministry: 78
Engineering: 73
Senior Class: 72
Business: 70
Student Experience: 61
Education: 56
Leadership, Entrepreneurship and Innovation: 27

There is still time to donate--even $5 helps here.  Pilots Give Site

Darn, CAS still trails those pesky nurses by three donors now.

And I see Men's Soccer has jumped into the lead, more than doubling their donors this morning. And how did the tennis guys get so popular?

up7587 wrote:And I see Men's Soccer has jumped into the lead, more than doubling their donors this morning.  And how did the tennis guys get so popular?

And, how is men’s basketball so unpopular? I guess that these are based on who you checked as your favorite team? You are allowed to give to more than one team at once.

SouthCarolinaPilot wrote:And, how is men’s basketball so unpopular? I guess that these are based on who you checked as your favorite team? You are allowed to give to more than one team at once.

I am guessing that many people figured they already support MBB through ticket purchases, Pilot Club, etc. So they either supported another athletic team, or they gave to one of the other categories. I designated CAS to help unlock one of the challenge grants.

SouthCarolinaPilot wrote:I guess that these are based on who you checked as your favorite team? You are allowed to give to more than one team at once.

When you make a donation, you select which/category/fund you want to donate to.  For example, I selected "Athletics" and then when filling out the specifics, I was able to specify which team I wanted to indicate the gift for.  I don't think you would be able to give to more than one at a time--it was a drop-down box to select the one program.  If you made a second donation to another program, I am not sure how the donation numbers would work, as I assume the site would be smart enough to know you were making a second donation, and this is all about the number of individual donors.  The website is a cool setup with the automated real-time leaderboard that is available on the site, but was also displayed on large screens in the Pilot House.  

It was a festive atmosphere in the Pilot House yesterday, as everyone who made a donation in person (and there were many) received a ticket for a free beer from the Rogue Tap Takeover at the pub... not to mention a nice spread of hors d' oeuvres.  This is a well-engineered event!

I think the more successful programs really embraced the challenge and engaged their networks of former players and fan bases. Obviously both the Men's and Women's soccer programs have a lot of energy right now, so it is not surprising that they are leading the way. Soccer also has more bodies involved annually than basketball (larger number of former players). Men's Tennis (defending WCC champs) must have had a call to action in their network as well--nicely done.

SouthCarolinaPilot wrote: I like knowing the coaches plans for the funds  (haven't been able to watch Portside to know if the other coaches discussed this).

They did!

Coach Nick said he'd use the additional funds for international recruiting travel and technology....specifically, GPS performance gear used by most high-level soccer programs to measures over 300 performance variables.

PilotNut wrote:We are over 2,180 donors... fantastic!  

There is still time to donate--even $5 helps here.  Pilots Give Site

One area of giving that is NOT on the leaderboard, but can be found on the home page, is the UP Fund For Tuition Assistance and Scholarships

This is where Mrs. DD and I directed our donations, and that fund currently has 393 supporters that have donated $149,000.....making it second only to the Athletic Department in terms of donors, and second only in terms of money donated to the College of Arts and Sciences.

I just had a heart attack, I thought for a second I had accidentally donated $2,018 but turns out my phone was just displaying it funny.

Ol' Deaner would have bought himself at least a month on the couch if he'd done that...

Dean Murdoch wrote:Ol' Deaner would have bought himself at least a month on the couch if he'd done that...

Hmm, well here's Ol' Deaner and his buddy, and former PilotNation contributor, Terry Cahill, already on the couch...

Great Reasons to Smoke #11: with all the money you're saving by smoking, you could donate a ton of Loonies....eh.