Company description

Life Lab is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization located on the farm of the Center for Agroecology & Sustainable Food Systems at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Life Lab cultivates children’s love of learning, healthy food, and nature through garden-based programs.

Founded in 1979, Life Lab is a pioneer and national leader in garden-based learning, providing children’s programs, training and curriculum to inspire children locally and nationally. We serve more than 5,000 local children each year through in-school and after-school programs, field trips, and day camps at partner schools across Santa Cruz County and in our Garden Classroom in Santa Cruz and our Blooming Classroom in Watsonville. Through professional development workshops here and around the U.S. and curriculum sales and sharing, Life Lab also has national impact, positively affecting the lives of more than 500,000 children across the U.S. annually.

Life Lab Core Values

Life Lab values collaboration, authentic communication, connection with people and nature, and open, inquiring minds. We also value individual initiative and cultivate a culture in which it can thrive. At Life Lab, we know that having a diversity of backgrounds and perspectives on our team improves our decision-making. In addition, we are serving increasingly diverse student populations, both directly in our partner schools and indirectly through the teachers we train. We recognize that staff members whose identities and lived experiences are relevant to those of our students help us have the greatest impact. Therefore:

Life Lab is committed to building a culturally diverse team and is an anti-discrimination, pro-equity organization. Because we are committed to building a staff that reflects the diversity of the communities and students we serve and to increasing the diversity of our workplace, people of color and with diverse backgrounds and perspectives are strongly encouraged to apply to join our team.

Job description

About the Position
The Development Associate is an integral part of Life Lab’s fundraising and community relations team, working closely with the Associate Director for Development, Communications and Impact Specialist, and Executive Director, as well as other members of the staff, volunteers, and our board of directors. The Development Associate’s role supporting the development and stewardship of our donor community is vital to the success and long-term sustainability of the organization.

Our diversified revenue model includes individual support, special events, public and private grants and contracts, and program-related revenue, and the Development Associate will have opportunities to be involved in a variety of fundraising projects and activities. The Development Associate reports to the Associate Director for Development. The work schedule is flexible and will include occasional weekend work for events and retreats. The position will have the opportunity to hire and supervise student workers for additional support.

Responsibilities
The Development Associate will help us maintain and improve our development systems, coordinate our events, increase our community outreach capacity, and build relationships with individual and organizational donors.

Donor Stewardship and Outreach (50%)
● Lead gift acknowledgment processes to ensure that donors receive appropriate documentation of gifts and are reminded of pledge payments;
● Provide ongoing management of the donor portions of our CRM data system (Neon);
● Support general donor stewardship communications, to keep supporters informed and involved and to ensure they understand the vital impact their support has on Life Lab’s work and know they are part of Life Lab’s community;
● Work closely with the Associate Director for Development and program leaders to identify individual donors and prospects and connect them with Life Lab activities and giving opportunities;
● Donor research and qualification;
● Support board members in their fundraising work.

Special Events (25%)
● Work closely with the Development team to plan and successfully implement our major annual fundraising event (200+ attendees) and smaller community events at other times of year;
● Maintain timeliness and momentum of preparations and follow-up for special events;
● Coordinate invitations, registrations and confirmations for events;
● Recruit and coordinate volunteers to support events.

Communications (15%)
Work with the communications team to create:
● Development related web and social media content;
● Donor information packets;
● Internal reports on various aspects of our development work.

Meetings and organization (10%)
● Development and communications team meetings;
● Staff meetings and planning retreats.

Qualifications
We’re looking for an energetic, skilled and dedicated development professional who loves relationship building and fundraising, with passion and commitment to support our programs and help shape Life Lab for sustainability and future growth.

Key qualities and skills we are seeking in the Development Associate are:
● nonprofit fundraising experience;
● a warm, personable nature;
● cross-cultural competency, with a deep commitment to equity and inclusion;
● excellent skills for communicating with diverse audiences, colleagues and partners in writing, by phone and in person;
● exercise of good judgment and maintaining confidentiality;
● experience in major events production;
● excellent organization, with systems for maintaining personal and team focus and priorities;
● strong Macintosh-based computing skills, including confident use of a CRM system, Google Apps, other cloud-based applications, spreadsheets, word processing programs,and online research and communication tools;
● attention to detail and accurate data entry;
● a passion for Life Lab’s mission and work;
● verbal and written Spanish language fluency;
● individual initiative within a collaborative group culture;
● comfort in leadership roles, including volunteer coordination;
● self-awareness and excellent interpersonal communication with team members;
● flexibility and a sense of humor.

Required Experience:
● 2 or more years of experience in a nonprofit development position doing similar work;
● 2 or more years experience using a complex CRM system (we use Neon CRM), ideally for development related work, ideally as a primary user
● 2 or more years experience coordinating events with more than 100 attendees, ideally fundraisers;
● 4 or more years of total experience working in a team office setting.

About the Location
The Life Lab office is located in an office trailer on the UC Santa Cruz farm, a 5-10 minute walk on a dirt path from the nearest parking lot. Closer parking is available for anyone with a disabled parking placard, and Life Lab makes reasonable accommodation for applicants and employees with known physical or mental disabilities. In keeping with the working farm environment, dress is casual. The office and surrounding Garden Classroom and farm are nonsmoking areas.

Compensation

this position is: salaried, varies DOE, $46,000.00 - $50,000.00

Application instructions

Deadline

July 26, 2019