Director of Development

Description

About Noble

Noble is Chicago’s highest-performing and largest network of public charter schools. Our 17 campuses and 1,600 employees currently serve 12,000 students, 98% of whom identify as persons of color, 90% as low-income, and 81% as first-generation college attendees. Noble’s mission is to ensure that all students have equitable and positive school experiences that equip them to complete college and lead choice-filled lives.

We are proud to be recognized nationally for college access and persistence. Noble supports more than 31,000 alumni, with 98% of students accepted into college and nearly 94% choosing to enroll.

The Director of Development is a senior individual contributor and operational leader within Noble's development function. Reporting to the Chief Development Officer and working in close partnership with the CEO, Board of Directors, and program leadership, the Director of Development is responsible for executing Noble's fundraising strategy across a portfolio of individual donors, foundations, and corporations.

This role exists to do three things exceptionally well:

• Manage and grow a portfolio of donors and prospects, cultivating relationships that result in five- and six-figure gifts in support of Noble's mission and strategic priorities.
• Drive day-to-day development operations with rigor and discipline, ensuring strong systems for pipeline management, grant compliance, stewardship, and reporting.
• Serve as a thought partner and force multiplier for the CDO, supporting high-stakes donor strategy, proposals, and board engagement with high-quality execution.

This role will help drive Noble’s next phase of fundraising growth, including expanding major gifts, increasing unrestricted support, strengthening institutional partnerships, developing new donor pipelines, and supporting long-term sustainability initiatives. The Director of Development is not entry-level. This leader brings strong relationship instincts, organizational discipline, and a deep commitment to the mission. They are equally comfortable in a donor meeting and a spreadsheet, and they understand that excellent fundraising is relational, not transactional.

• Manage an active portfolio of individual donors, foundations, and corporate funders, with primary responsibility for five-, six-, and seven-figure gift cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship.
• Build and sustain authentic, long-term relationships with donors by connecting them to Noble's mission, student outcomes, and strategic priorities.
• Develop and execute tailored engagement strategies for donors at each stage of the giving cycle.
• Represent Noble externally in donor meetings, site visits, and cultivation events.
• Support the development of Noble’s emerging corporate partnerships strategy, including cultivation of mission-aligned business leaders and corporate philanthropy opportunities.

• Manage the full lifecycle of foundation and institutional grants, including prospecting, proposal development, compliance, reporting, and renewal.
• Partner with the grants manager, as well as program, finance, and academic teams to ensure proposals are grounded in Noble's work and accurately reflect outcomes.
• Maintain a strong pipeline of institutional prospects aligned to Noble's strategic plan.

• Ensure the development team's operational infrastructure supports consistent, high-quality fundraising execution, including CRM management, gift processing, acknowledgment, and reporting.
• Track portfolio performance and pipeline progress using data; surface insights and flag risks to the CDO on a regular basis.
• Success in this role requires strong portfolio management discipline, including maintaining accurate CRM data, managing donor movement through cultivation stages, and consistently advancing fundraising goals against measurable benchmarks.
• Support the development and refinement of case statements, donor materials, impact reports, and stewardship experiences.
• Partner with communications to ensure donor-facing content is compelling and aligned…