Jen Howe

Jennifer (Jen) has 30 years of experience in higher education advancement — assessing, developing, and leading high-performing teams; planning and executing comprehensive campaigns; implementing new and elevating existing fundraising programs; and fostering team culture and talent management within alumni relations and development. She engages with institutions in a solution-oriented, relationship-focused way that amplifies and elevates their full advancement effort across engagement, philanthropy, volunteer leadership recruitment, stewardship, and development operations.

Philanthropy has unlimited potential — it not only sustains the important mission of higher education institutions but also serves as a phenomenal catalyst for change, innovation, and impact.”

About Jen

Jen provides advancement expertise to higher education and academic medical center clients to ensure their fundraising, engagement, and operational units align with industry best practices. This enables them to address some of their most emergent priorities, opportunities, and challenges through increased philanthropic support and effective volunteer management.

Jen has extensive experience assessing existing advancement efforts, developing new engagement and fundraising programs, designing campaigns and special fundraising initiatives, aligning advancement services and operations, and deploying advancement communication strategies. She also implements team and performance structures that attract and grow advancement talent. All of this allows her to provide real-time counsel focused on maximizing the return on advancement investments made by her clients.

Throughout her career, Jen has:

• Publicly launched a $2 billion advancement campaign for a public research university and institute of technology while resetting the entire fundraising structure to align with best practices.
• Fully rebuilt the advancement effort for a private Catholic research university and launched its first comprehensive campaign in over 20 years, driving over $400 million — more than twice the last campaign. This reset also led to over 1,000 new volunteers in defined roles supporting the institution, reversed a significant decline in alumni and overall donor counts, and doubled new commitments to over $60 million per year.
• Helped lead comprehensive campaign efforts at a private research university, managing multiple college, school, and central unit fundraising teams; developing new fundraising programs for international and interdisciplinary support needs; coordinating fundraising efforts with the medical center; and directly securing major and principal support.
• Designed integrated advancement efforts that have led to historic, record years of new philanthropy for major universities, including those with academic medical centers.
• Launched comprehensive campaigns ranging from $2 billion to $400 million and new fundraising programs in international advancement and interdisciplinary research that have helped fuel major and principal giving efforts.
• Created advancement team structures and environments that foster excellent private support outcomes for institutions and ensure vibrant talent management practices.
• Developed interconnected processes, policies, and operational units that generate greater team efficiencies and utilization of front-facing advancement staff.
• Navigated the ever-changing and complex landscape of collegiate athletics to secure critical support for facilities; endowment; name, image, and likeness (NIL) licensing; programs; and discretionary spending.

Prior to joining Huron, Jen served as senior philanthropic adviser to the president and vice president for development at the Georgia Institute of Technology (GT). Before GT, she held the role of vice president for advancement at the University of Dayton. Jen’s most extensive time was spent as associate vice chancellor for development and alumni relations at Vanderbilt University. All of this experience was built on the foundational, early-career exposure Jen achieved at Emory University, where she served in multiple roles across the office of the provost and advancement. 

Jen earned a Bachelor of Arts in English with honors from James Madison University.

Jen has been a member of the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) since 1997, having acted as a volunteer leader in multiple activities, including the CASE Summit for Leaders in Advancement, the Annual Conference for Corporate and Foundation Relations, the CASE Campaigns Workshop, and the CASE Top 50.