Women in Charge Three Seniors Lead the Way in Fundraising

By Louise Uffelman
July 4, 2017

Three women are helping to lead the way in raising the Class of 2018’s senior gift. Jane Chiavelli  (Ashland, Massachusetts) is an accounting and business administration major, minoring in education policy; Julia Gsell (Houston) is majoring in journalism and art history; and Hannah Powell (Rockville, Virginia) is majoring in English and international politics.

Although the focus is to solicit contributions from their peers, their most important task as senior gift directors is to choose the associate class agent team. “These are the people who actually go out and ask their friends to donate,” explained Gsell. “When picking these ACAs, we look for leaders in our class who are involved, outgoing and approachable. Our goal in this is to cover every corner of campus, so we can connect with as many people in our class as possible.”

Chiavelli decided to become involved because “I get to interact with people from different parts of campus. We all represent different organizations, clubs, majors and sports team, yet we are all working together to reach a common goal.”

Powell added, “I adore the Class of 2018 and, upon learning who else would be a Lead Class Agent, I knew I’d be part of a team that would accurately and fairly represent our incredible peers. I love W&L, and would do anything to ensure future Generals have the same empowering experiences I’ve had here.”

As a work-study in the Development Office for the last two years, Gsell has worked on several different projects, but “working with senior gift allows me to work directly with my classmates, which is why I love it so much. I get to devote my time to teaching my friends about how to give back to the place that has given them so much.

The ultimate goal — of course — is to beat the previous record categories of last year’s senior gift. As Gsell noted, “The funds go to the Annual Fund, which is all non-restricted giving. We’d like to hit 85-percent participation and $20,000 (these would be new records) but we haven’t set our official goal yet.”