Director of Development And Communications
Position Summary
The Director of Development and Communication provides strategic, operational, and relationship-centered leadership for Trinity School’s development, communications, and community engagement efforts. This role leads fundraising, donor relations, stewardship, advancement events, parent and volunteer engagement, institutional communications, marketing, branding, and storytelling.
Essential Responsibilities
Lead Trinity’s development strategy in alignment with the school’s mission, strategic priorities, financial sustainability, and purposefully small preschool through Grade 5 model.
Develop, implement, and evaluate an annual development plan that includes fundraising, donor engagement, stewardship, communications, volunteer participation, and event goals.
Lead the annual giving program, including strategy, messaging, segmentation, volunteer engagement, solicitation, follow-up, reporting, and stewardship.
Partner with the Head of School and Board leadership to identify, cultivate, solicit, and steward donors in support of annual giving, campaign priorities, special projects, and long-term institutional needs.
Identify and develop new sources of philanthropic support, including alumni families, grandparents, friends of the school, corporate partners, foundations, and other mission-aligned prospects.
Donor Relations, Stewardship, and Events
Build and maintain meaningful relationships with current families, alumni families, grandparents, trustees, former trustees, employees, friends of the school, and community partners.
Lead or coordinate major fundraising events, including the gala and other advancement events, with responsibility for fundraising strategy, volunteer coordination, donor engagement, sponsorship opportunities, event messaging, and follow-up.
Support donor cultivation by preparing materials, tracking outreach, coordinating next steps, and partnering with the Head of School and trustees on relationship-centered donor engagement.
Serve long-term philanthropic opportunities, including endowment growth, through donor education, stewardship, messaging, and coordinated development planning.
Advancement Operations and Data
Oversee advancement operations, including donor database management, gift processing, acknowledgments, pledge tracking, donor records, reporting, and confidential donor information.
Maintain accurate gift tracking and recording systems for gifts, pledges, donor restrictions, acknowledgments, campaign data, event revenue, and stewardship notes.
Partner with the Business Office to support accurate gift processing, reconciliation, fund tracking, pledge reporting, financial reporting, and responsible management of the development budget.
Use donor data, giving trends, communications analytics, and constituent feedback to inform fundraising strategy, stewardship, reporting, and continuous improvement.
Communications, Marketing, and Storytelling
Coordinate Trinity’s communications and marketing strategy in partnership with the Head of School and administrative colleagues, ensuring messaging is clear, warm, accurate, inclusive, mission-aligned, and consistent.
Steward Trinity’s institutional voice, visual identity, brand consistency, public presence, and reputation across communications for current families, prospective families, alumni families, donors, trustees, employees, and external audiences.
Develop messaging that showcases Trinity’s preschool through Grade 5 program, Episcopal identity, student experience, academic life, faculty excellence, community traditions, commitment to belonging, and the impact of philanthropic support.
Partner with Enrollment on outreach collateral, admission materials, prospective-family storytelling, and enrollment-facing communications.
Parent Partnership and Volunteer Engagement
Collaborate with the Head of Elementary, who serves as the primary administrative liaison to TPA, as well as TPA leadership and school administrators, to help ensure parent-led events and volunteer activities are well-coordinated, mission-aligned, inclusive, and manageable for staff and volunteers.
Provide guidance and support to parent volunteer leaders, event chairs, and committee leads, particularly in areas related to fundraising, advancement, alumni engagement, grandparent engagement, communications, and community-building efforts.
Recruit, support, and steward volunteers involved in fundraising, development events, communications, alumni engagement, grandparent engagement, and other advancement-related community initiatives.
Leadership and Collaboration
Serve as a trusted partner to the Head of School and Board of Trustees by preparing donor materials, supporting donor outreach, contributing to development committee work, and accompanying donor conversations when appropriate.
Collaborate across departments to ensure development, communications, marketing, enrollment, events, and community engagement efforts are coordinated, accurate, and mission-aligned.
Manage consultants, contractors, vendors, designers, writers, photographers, videographers, printers, or support staff working in service of development and communications goals.
Communicate proactively with colleagues about fundraising timelines, parent volunteer needs, event expectations, communications deadlines, and cross-departmental dependencies.
Maintain confidentiality, sound judgment, professionalism, warmth, and follow-through in all school, donor, family, employee, volunteer, vendor, consultant, alumni family, community partner, parent leader, and external partner relationships.