Edinburgh Napier University strives to deliver the best teaching, to the widest range of students who can benefit from it, in ways that are appropriate to the needs of students and employers. Philanthropic support plays a critical role for many students by providing much-needed financial assistance and encouragement to enable them to access and complete higher education, as well as pursue extra opportunities to enhance their studies whilst they are at university.
Our Development Office works with a wide range of partners to assist the development of the University, its students, alumni and staff. It has two main aims: to raise philanthropic funds and to enhance the University's relationships with its alumni and friends worldwide.
As such, we are currently recruiting a Development Officer to grow fundraising and lead the disbursement of the University Scholarships and Awards programme by expanding the portfolio of valued donors.
The Role:
As Development Officer, you will have the opportunity to use your experience in fundraising or sales to generate income from corporate and individual donor relationships, in turn growing new scholarship and bursary funding.
Your fundraising knowledge/experience and proficiency in soliciting donations from companies/individuals will serve you well, as you lead the development and implementation of our strategy to grow named scholarships, and bursaries, in line with the department fundraising plan.
The role will also give you the chance to use your strong relationship building skills and ability to quickly build rapport, to engage with philanthropists, corporates and charitable trusts, building their sense of connection to the Edinburgh Napier students who will directly benefit from the funding that you secure, making this a truly rewarding role.
We expect that your strong attention to detail will allow you to manage the administrative duties of the post as well, and you will need to use your understanding of basic finance procedures (including overseeing income and expenditure accounts) to maintain accurate records of awards, ensuring that budgets for various student scholarship and grant programmes are managed.
This is a post that will see you making a positive and profound difference in the lives of many of the students that we support. Furthermore, we hope that this will be a logical next step for you as you build on your fundraising knowledge/experience, taking on a role that will see you meeting a wide variety of interesting people, while supporting the University in planning approaches for philanthropic backing of our academic objectives.
What we will need from you:
- Further or higher education, or relevant work experience
- Experience of sales or soliciting donations from companies or individuals
- Ability to assess funding applications and liaise with student applicants
- Experience of working in a customer-focused role including dealing with queries and resolving issues
- Experience of writing formal reports, case studies or papers.
- Excellent communication and organisational skills
Benefits we offer:
41 days annual leave, generous pension scheme (17.6%), flexible working and professional development opportunities. Our benefits can be viewed here.