Development Intern; RMMF

Supervisor: Noreen Castor, Associate Director of Development

Location: Robert R. McCormick Foundation, 205 N Michigan Ave, Ste 4300, Chicago, IL 60601

The McCormick Foundation is one of Chicago’s leading philanthropic organizations with the mission of fostering communities of educated, informed, and engaged citizens. Our aim is to assist communities, strengthen democracy, and help ensure that all families and children have the opportunities they need to flourish.

We do this by investing in organizations that demonstrate a commitment to creating value in one or more of our key areas of work – early childhood education, journalism and the First Amendment, youth civic engagement, assistance for under-resourced communities, and serving veterans. When we make grants, we look for motivated, knowledgeable, and passionate organizations who think holistically about social issues and how we can effectively contribute to the solution together.

We are committed to having measurable, systemic impact on the areas we invest in, and holding ourselves accountable for these results.

The Communities Program helps to transform under-resourced communities by giving people access to programs which improve their lives. Through its Communities Matching Fund, Impact Englewood Fund, and partnerships with sport teams and philanthropic organizations, it raises money for local needs and provides matching funds to increase the impact of charitable giving. Grants are then made to qualified nonprofit organizations with programs that help transition low-income children, adults and families to self-sufficiency.

To achieve greater impact, the Communities Program focuses on programs in education, economic security, and community health.

The McCormick Foundation’s Communities Program is seeking a detail-oriented and creative individual with excellent communication and multi-tasking skills to work on its Development team for a six-month internship from July 2018 to December 2018. This individual should have a strong understanding of and/or affinity for fundraising, philanthropy, and marketing.

The individual will be tasked with and will receive exposure to a variety of projects associated with the front and back-end operations of a Development department. Over the course of the internship, the individual will have responsibilities involving fundraising campaigns; major gifts; marketing; donor stewardship; gift processing and reporting;
Raiser’s Edge database; and research. The individual will work with each member of the team and will have the opportunity to help shape new fundraising tactics.

• Assist with creation, copywriting, and production of solicitation materials including direct mail letters, emails, online ads, social media, blog posts
• Help create content and build engagement across digital channels, and manage the distribution and execution processes between internal teams and external stakeholders

• Assist with projects that promote the work of Communities Program such as brochures, white papers, social media posts, website copy

• Help with the creation, copywriting, and production of donor acknowledgements and stewardship emails
• Assist with the planning and execute the major donor thank you notes process
• Manage and execute the mid-level donor thank you note process
• Help prepare materials and assist in finalizing logistics for major donor cultivation events
• Assist with creation of a prospect cultivation and/or new donor welcome series

• Perform gift and acknowledgment letter processing, and database clean-up projects
• Execute administrative tasks such as matching gift processing and review of operational documentations
• Perform basic level analysis and assist with reporting

• Assist with research to support the major donor program
• Compile and summarize current industry trends and fundraising benchmarks

• Assist in managing high school interns

• Recent college graduate or graduate student with a degree in Nonprofit, Social Work,…