Leadership
Meet the ASU Foundation for a New American University's talented leadership team.
Executive Cabinet
Gretchen Buhlig
Chief Executive Officer
Gretchen Buhlig is the Chief Executive Officer of the Arizona State University Foundation for A New American University. Since joining the ASU Foundation in January 2012, Gretchen has been a catalyst for transformational change, generating record-breaking fundraising success and surpassing campaign goals year after year. Gretchen’s ultimate goal is to provide the tools, knowledge, and autonomy to enable a pipeline of future leaders to feel empowered and motivated to achieve their goals. She is a relationship-oriented idea-generator and drives large-scale institutional impact through transformative gifts.
Lauren Brown
Chief of Staff & Vice President, Development Services
Lauren Brown serves as the Chief of Staff & Vice President of Development Services where she provides oversight of strategic initiatives within transdisciplinary units at the foundation and ASU, leads all central development services and operations and manages the Foundation’s Board of Directors.
Bill Kavan
Vice President, Engagement & Outreach
Bill Kavan is the Vice President for Engagement & Outreach. He provides strategic management and oversight of the foundation's Engagement and Outreach division, which includes the following teams: Scholarship Advancement, Donor Relations, Annual Giving, ASU Family, Alumni Success, Engagement Programs (President's Club, Women and Philanthropy) and Engagement and Outreach Development.
Patrick McDermott
Chief Global Advancement Officer
Patrick McDermott serves as Chief Global Advancement Officer, leading ASU Foundation’s growing global and regional advancement teams – including professional staff in California, Hawaii, Texas, Ohio, and North Carolina, as well as London and Shanghai in building engagement and support for ASU’s mission. Patrick also manages advancement teams for ASU’s Global Futures Laboratory and Thunderbird School of Global Management.
Scott Nelson
Vice President, Enterprise Development & Senior Associate Athletic Director
Scott Nelson is the Vice President for Enterprise Development and the Senior Associate Athletic Director of the Sun Devil Club. Scott works closely with Sun Devil Athletics senior leadership and coaches to develop a comprehensive resource raising strategy with a focus on connecting with alumni, donors, and athletic fans to provide the resources required to support 26 NCAA DI sports and 600+ student-athletes. Scott also manages the Educational Outreach and Student Services and Cultural Affairs development teams.
Jacqueline Smith
Senior Vice President
Jacqueline Smith, J.D. serves as Senior Vice President at the ASU Foundation. Jacqueline designs opportunities for presidential level prospects and organizational funders to invest in Arizona State University as a New American University. She also enhances ASU’s competitiveness for “big bet” and moonshot funding opportunities. Jacqueline manages the Presidential Advancement, Moonshot and Science Philanthropy, Corporate Philanthropy and Foundation Development teams.
Eric Spicer
Vice President, Unit Development
Eric Spicer is the Vice President for Unit Development, where he leads a team of fundraising professionals who are embedded within colleges at ASU. Eric provides vision, strategy, and donor support to Assistant Vice Presidents and Executive Directors of Development in advancement of the ASU charter.
Senior Leadership Team
Vanessa Barrera
Executive Director of Donor Relations and Engagement
Vanessa Barrera serves as Executive Director of Donor Relations and Engagement. She oversees a team responsible for strategically nurturing and advancing relationships, acknowledging and recognizing donors for their philanthropy, demonstrating impact, expressing gratitude, enhancing donor retention, facilitating future giving, and providing a consistent and positive experience for donors and volunteers to deepen their connection.
Briana Cons
Associate Vice President, Research & Evaluation
Briana Cons serves as the Associate Vice President of Research & Evaluation, where she oversees research support services for development operations, including prospect identification, wealth analysis, giving trends, engagement strategies, and data management.
Roger Edgar
Vice President, Presidential Advancement
Roger Edgar serves as Vice President of Presidential Advancement. In that capacity, he supports President Crow and Foundation leadership to further advance transformational philanthropy in support of ASU as a New American University through raising and investing private contributions.
Travis Egbert
Deputy Chief of Staff
Travis Egbert is the Deputy Chief of Staff at the ASU Foundation, overseeing various central operations including operational budget management, strategic planning, and the senior leadership summit. He also assists with special projects and leads the Foundation Initiatives team, a central project management team tasked with coordinating interdisciplinary philanthropic projects and initiatives.
Karen Evans
Executive Director of Engagement, Thunderbird School of Global Management
Karen Evans serves as Executive Director of Engagement for Thunderbird School of Global Management, working with a diverse and globally-connected network of alumni and supporters across 150 countries. Ranked the number 1 school globally for international trade, Thunderbird’s mission is to develop nimble, ethical, global leaders who can seize the opportunities of the Fourth Industrial Revolution to create sustainable prosperity worldwide.
Erin Gage
Executive Director of Development, W. P. Carey School of Business
Erin Gage serves as the Executive Director of Development for the W. P. Carey School of Business, the largest and one of the top-ranked business schools in the United States. The school is internationally regarded for its research productivity and its distinguished faculty members, including a Nobel Prize winner. Students come from more than 100 countries and W. P. Carey is represented by alumni in over 160 countries.
Jody Kaulukukui
Executive Director of Advancement, Hawai`i
Jody Kaulukukui is the Executive Director of Advancement, Hawai`i, where she oversees advancement, development and external relations efforts for ASU and ASUF’s work in the islands. She works closely with ASU to develop collaborative partnerships and projects across Hawai`i that focus on education, sustainability, communities, and indigenous knowledge systems.
Lindsy Manning
Executive Director, Campaign
Lindsy Manning serves as the Executive Director of Campaign. In this role, Lindsy leads the design and execution of the university’s forthcoming comprehensive campaign, which will advance the ASU Charter locally and globally.
Jennifer Marsteen
Executive Director of Development, The College
Jennifer Marsteen is the Executive Director of Development for The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences where she leads development efforts for the largest college at Arizona State University. She creates development strategies, leads fundraising efforts, and builds relationships with faculty, staff, alumni, community members, parents, and industry while advancing the ASU charter. The College is the academic heart of the university and fosters educational excellence, intellectual inquiry, discovery, and access to our 29,800 students and with 760+ faculty in the natural sciences, social sciences and humanities.
Carly Nieri
Executive Director of Development, ASU Health
Carly Nieri serves as the Executive Director of Development for ASU Health where she oversees fundraising for the new School of Medicine and Advanced Medical Engineering and School of Public Health Technology. She also leads a team of experienced fundraisers in the College of Health Solutions, the Edson College of Nursing and Health Innovation, and Biodesign Institute. Together, their focus is to raise philanthropic funds that advance the health outcomes and wellbeing of the communities in Arizona, and around the world.
Kimberly Roland
Assistant Vice President, Corporate Philanthropy
Kimberly Roland is the Assistant Vice President of Corporate Philanthropy at the ASU Foundation. Kimberly designs strategies to engage corporate partners and convenes industry leaders in pursuit of impact philanthropy. She builds bridges to connect business leaders to charitable opportunities across Arizona State University that align with their organizational mission, vision, and values.
Vince Volpe
Associate Athletics Director
Vince Volpe is the Associate Athletics Director for Sun Devil Athletics Development and is charged with leading the operations of the Sun Devil Club. Vince leads all philanthropic giving opportunities in support of Sun Devil Athletics which includes major giving, annual giving, former student-athlete letterwinner engagement and the overall donor experience.
David Wahls
Executive Director of Development, Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering
David Wahls serves as the Executive Director of Development for the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering where he leads a development team to build comprehensive partnerships with industry, alumni, parents, and community individuals to advance the Fulton Schools of Engineering, ASU and our region. The Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering is the largest and most comprehensive engineering school in the nation, with over 27,000 students and 450 faculty as of 2021.