Laura Bray recently took over as president of the UWM Foundation. She previously served eight years at Milwaukee Area Technical College as vice president of college advancement and external communications and executive director of the MATC Foundation. Bray also spent a decade as the executive director of Menomonee Valley Partners from 2004 to 2014. In total, she has 30 years of experience in economic development, higher education, advancement, public-private partnerships and nonprofit strategy. BizTimes reporter Samantha Dietel spoke with Bray about her vision for the UWM Foundation’s future. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.
BizTimes: What drew you to this role as president of the UWM Foundation?
Bray: “I have worked in various leadership positions for almost 30 years in Milwaukee, and I’m deeply committed to Milwaukee’s success. I think that, especially at this moment in time, the UWM Foundation is uniquely positioned to help power the region’s future. It’s evolving to more than a funding vehicle for the university. It’s this intersection between working for economic development and as a talent engine for Milwaukee that really drew me. (UWM) is the only R1 university in the state that also is open access. If you think about this being UWM at the intersection between innovation and opportunity and providing access to people for upward mobility, for career success through education is a huge piece of it, through scholarships and through investment in scholarships, but also in research. It’s just a fascinating place to work at the intersection in the world of economic development through an organization like the UWM Foundation.”
How have your previous roles prepared you to lead the UWM Foundation?
“I was at the Menomonee Valley for 10 years but also worked for the Department of City Development. There, we were the kind of backbone nonprofit organization that helped facilitate – during my tenure – almost a billion dollars’ worth of redevelopment in that area, where we worked alongside the public sector (and) the business community to redevelop that area. I’ve been at Milwaukee Area Technical College for the last eight and a half years, and one of the big things that I did there was to really develop scholarships alongside philanthropists like Joe and Ellen Checota or Froedtert Hospital, or many people through the MATC Promise (free tuition program) where we looked at, how do you design scholarships in a way that truly, truly means that students complete, that it opens access to them to even consider education, and that there’s built0in connection to the workforce. It’s not just about looking for people to donate to scholarships, just more broadly, but it’s really directed intent on taking on some difficult issues of people being able to participate fully in the region’s talent pipeline, through having more access to education.
“From a financial leadership perspective and from a philanthropic perspective, when I was at the Menomonee Valley Partners, we did a $25 million campaign to expand the Hank Aaron State Trail and build Three Bridges Park, and then also bring a third branch of the Urban Ecology Center to the Menomonee Valley. I have that experience of fundraising.
“But then also at MATC, I was able to work in partnership to grow our fundraising about 700% over the course of the eight years that I was there to engage people differently in the college for fundraising. I feel like the full thing is that when you look at my background and all of that, what this organization does, I feel like it’s a real culmination of the different experiences I’ve had in my career. But for me as a person, I love to grow. I love to take on new challenges. It’s about taking those experiences and then harnessing them for the future of UWM and the foundation.”
What is your vision for the UWM Foundation moving forward?
“I think that throughout the entire interview process and then speaking with the members of the board and seeing the opportunity, I think that the foundation for several decades has been a quiet supporter of UWM and has taken on things like the two dorms and other things that were critical. But I think that the foundation will evolve from that quiet supporter to a strategic and visible backbone of the mission and impact of UWM. At a time where there’s just so many headwinds and changes with public funding, and how the evolution comes to engage private support and support beyond what the university can do on its own, is going to be the next decade of work, absolutely. I think that the foundation has a very strong reputation of real estate and financial management and stewardship of people’s philanthropy, so I feel like there’s an opportunity to build on that momentum and that strength, to become more visible and more unified and more ambitious in the role that the foundation plays.
“Part of what I intend to do early on is, I’ve been active with a national association called the Association of Governing Bodies that helps to support foundations like UWM Foundation or the MATC Foundation, and really kind of learning from peers across the country, and thinking about where do we see the importance of philanthropy and research and this kind of public-private partnership playing a role.
“But then also, I mean, how exciting to have this position at the same time we have a new chancellor. I was a very huge fan of Chancellor (Mark) Mone. At MATC, I would work on some of the teams for M-cubed, and I see that being really important, which is the alignment of MPS, MATC and UWM. I got a chance to work with Chancellor Mone on several things, and now with Chancellor (Thomas) Gibson, I just think it’s going to be really neat to partner with him and with university leadership to chart the course of the future together.”
As you take on this new role, what do you see as your potential challenges ahead?
“I think that all of us are going to have to figure out the results of the changes that have happened at the federal level, and exactly what is in the fine print. There were huge changes proposed originally for Pell, and those didn’t go through at that level. And actually, there was a provision that happened for Pell that could be very good for organizations like UWM and for MATC, that’s called the workforce Pell shorter-term credentials. I think that really understanding those changes will be important.
“But even before the complex political and social environment, you have demographic shifts, which are tremendous, where you have less people that are college age. At the same time, you have this huge demand for a skilled workforce. The workforce shortages are real, and so I think that you know how AI changes the world of both education and work.
“One of the opportunities that I think is something that will happen in the course of the next 10 years, and it’s starting to happen now, is that you have the largest transfer of wealth in our nation’s history that will be coming up with the Baby Boomers, both putting together their final plans for philanthropy and for their estate planning, but then also their children inheriting the wealth that’s been accumulated by the Baby Boomers, and having a moment of saying, how might you inspire them to even during their working years, to think about where they might invest thoughtfully into scalable solutions that have real impact.”
What are your thoughts on the foundation’s role in supporting research at UWM considering recent cuts to federal funding for research?
“Research at an R1 institution is so critical for economic development in an area. It’s for science and for entrepreneurship and for new discoveries in their own right but having that really seen as a backbone of economic development for our community is so critical. I need to dig in to really understand the implications of research dollars.
“From a broad perspective, I think partnerships with the business community are going to be important more now than ever. Because if we want to continue having the groundbreaking research that comes out of UWM, and continuing to be an R1 institution, and continuing to have, both (University of Wisconsin-Madison) and University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee being shining lights in Wisconsin’s economy, it’s going to be so critical that we maintain investment in that innovation. The research foundation is a huge piece of that. I know that we have organizations that have seeded funding for some of the early planning grants for entrepreneurs and for inventors and innovators at the university, and I hope to be able to grow that seed funding.”
How do you plan to improve donor engagement?
“You have 200,000 alumni and a student body that is reflected in the region’s workforce, and most of the people that graduate from UWM stay in the state. One of the things that happened a couple of years ago is that the Alumni Association came under the foundation, and so now that’s one piece of what the foundation helps to support. I think really early on, understanding what gets people excited about being involved, not only as an alum, but actually as an alum donor, will be important for me. And then having almost a kitchen cabinet of alumni donors that can help me think through, how do we engage others?
But like I said, that wealth transfer – I just think there’s just a time to reimagine philanthropy for Milwaukee’s next generation of leaders, and that time is now. How do we inspire a new generation of donors and individuals and families and corporations? We have a generous city with deep roots in generational giving and so, how do we spark that?
“... Thinking about the employer experience of engagement with a university is important, just like we think of the students’ experience and say, how do you make it easier to partner? And sometimes that doesn’t start with philanthropy. Sometimes it starts with, we want to have internships for students. I think part of my early time will be to make the relationships with all the different parts of the university that touch those employee relations, so that I can really do warm handoffs as I’m meeting with people in the business community (so) that their immediate needs are met. I hope that as they see the importance of scholarships funding. Even though UW tuition is certainly something that is not as expensive as going out of state, a lot of students need scholarship support. It’s super critical. And it’s not just individuals that might want to establish endowments or establish a scholarship in their name. It may be companies that say we want to be viewed as a preferred employer, and we want to be viewed as someone that’s supporting the education that leads to employment, potentially, not only in our industry. I think engaging multiple kinds of donors and in my first 90 days just understanding how they are engaged today, and then looking for opportunities and openings to grow on that strength, is where I will be focused.”
