The 'fun' back in Funds
By Ryan Rogers
Sports Editor
October 17, 2007
 Nobody ever said being a Lancer was easy. Balancing going to class, studying, staying fit, making practice and competing on a varsity team is a big commitment, but that sometimes isn’t enough to get the team to reach its highest levels.
Among these commitments to the team, Lancers are dedicated to helping to raise funds, as well.
While Lancer coaches are ultimately responsible for balancing the team’s budget, the teams themselves are often required to generate much of the additional funds they require to achieve all of the team’s goals for a season.
The Lancers football program stays in touch with their alumni through the Touchdown Club, which is “a voluntary association of supporters, fans, alumni and friends committed to assisting the Lancer Football program,” according to its mission statement. Through fund-raising activities and donations, the Touchdown Club specifically links donations to the team ensuring that it can provide the highest quality possible – to the largest and most expensive program on the varsity campus.
Many other varsity teams make good use of a ‘phonathon’ where current athletes reach out to past athletes to raise funds for future athletes. Mona Dosen, from the Office of University Advancement is a Development Officer concentrated on Annual Giving. “One aspect of my job is to manage the ‘phonathon,’ for all the faculties and athletics,” said Dosen.
During these phonathons, current members of varsity teams update the contact information of alumni and friends of the university by phone, and provide them with any information they might be interested in. Dosen said, “[We] provide them (the alumni) with any information they want about the team, [like] what the upcoming schedule looks like. If they have any questions, the coaches and current players are usually in the call centre when we make the calls.”
She continued, “We also ask them (alumni) for a donation to the University of Windsor. They (the teams) have their own current members contacting past members for future varsity players.”
While all the faculties reach out to their alumni, Dosen said that the department of athletics receives very strong results. “Athletics has one of the highest participation rates on campus,” said Dosen. “They’re very well connected to the university. They have quite a high participation rate,” she continued.
Dosen said that using the phonathon to announce other fund-raising ideas that the teams are planning works to generate interest and funds, too.
“If [the teams] have a golf tournament coming up, they can announce it during the phonathon,” said Dosen. “The different teams run golf tournaments, they run galas, silent auctions. There’s a variety of things they can do. They can even do direct-mail appeals,” she continued.
The phonathon can be a lot of work, Dosen admits. “It depends on how many people [the team has]. The football team has a huge alumni base. It would take longer to make their calls than the volleyball team, so it just depends on how many people they have in their alumni database. Track and field is another big one,” she said.
Other teams are lucky to be able to compete in the Big 10 NCAA markets, and cash in at the gates. Lancers Men’s Hockey head coach Pete Belliveau said his team raises up to 30 per cent of its annual budget playing just three games in four days.
By playing non-conference games against Michigan, Michigan State and Bowling Green University, the Lancers Men’s Hockey team gets to compete against some strong clubs, and make a lot of money for their team.
Head Coach Pete Belliveau said, “We just did the phonathon two weeks ago, and I’m pretty happy with that, too.”
The Lancers Women’s Soccer team runs soccer-related camps for young women in high school to raise additional funds for their club. “We hold the biggest high school girl’s soccer tournament at the end of April,” said Women’s Soccer head coach Kris Geier. “There’s an indoor tournament we hold at the end of February, and we also run a junior girls tournament which is the second weekend in May.” And Geier is planning on hosting a golf tournament to raise some more money later on in the spring.
Geier said that he raises the additional funds so he can afford to treat his players well. “The university pays for everything for us, in terms of games and referees, but we wanted a spring trip. We went to Florida, plus extra sweatshirts, and T-shirts, and stuff like that,” said Geier.
Much of this additional fund-raising is due to a smaller alumni base to tap into during the phonathons. “We don’t generate a lot of money through that (phonathon), but it’s a good way for us to stay in touch with our alumni,” he admitted.
Geier believes that the response from varsity alumni during the phonathons is so strong because the varsity athletes are treated very well by the university. “They get treated good for being athletes,” said Geier. “I think to give back, you give back for the ways you’ve been treated.”
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