Morris named vice president of Advancement by the College

Chanelle Koehn- Staff Writer
2/10/12

Despite the enormous responsibilities and qualifications, many students of William Jewell College do not realize the importance of the position of vice president of Advancement for the institution. The position, formerly held by Dr. Chad Jolly ’94 has been given to Clark Morris ’91, who also serves as the Harriman-Jewell Series executive director.
According to Dr. David Sallee, president of the College, Jolly decided to step down from his position at William Jewell because he had reached a point in his career where he was looking for a change.
“It was a positive change for [Jolly] because he received a very good opportunity to become a fundraising consultant,” Sallee said.
Fortunately for William Jewell, Morris fit the job qualifications for vice president of Advancement extremely well.
“The College is basically my life,” Morris said in response to his interest in the position.
Morris, who began working part-time in the Harriman-Jewell office as a junior in college, has been serving the College for about 22 years. During Sallee’s 11 years at William Jewell, Morris has developed a respect for Sallee and said that the prospect to serve as vice president of Advancement seemed enchanting because he would get to work even closer with Sallee.
Feelings of immense respect are mutual between Sallee and Morris.
“Clark has a great deal of experience and leadership roles,” Sallee said. “His work as executive director of the Harriman-Jewell Series has provided him with experience in leadership, management and fundraising.”
Morris said his goals at the moment are less specific to the position and more transitory in value.
“Right now I need to become close to the personnel in my new position, and work on acclimating to my new duties,” Morris said.
In addition to Morris’ new position as vice president of advancement, he will continue to work as executive director of the Harriman-Jewell Series. The College will hire an additional member in the Harriman-Jewell Office who will essentially work as associate director of the program. Ideally, the new member will help balance Morris’ workload, but Morris will still have authority over the program.
“I have a very personal commitment to the [Harriman-Jewell] program,” Morris said. “Richard Harriman was my mentor and good friend, so I want to ensure that we continue to have great success in the program.”
Morris said that it will be hard to balance both positions at first but believes it will become easier once he has made the transition between offices.
Sallee believes that the transitional period will be the most immediate challenge of Morris’ career.
“Morris will need to get our advancement program aligned in terms of personnel,” Sallee said. “He’ll also need to assess the work that needs to be done in the position … Right now the immediate issue is fundraising.”
Morris agreed that fundraising will be the most challenging long-term issue.
“We’ve just come through a recession,” Morris said, “so the fundraising climate isn’t great, but it’s okay.”
The office of Advancement has just completed the first phase of its fundraising campaign. Morris said that, as far as fundraising, deciding the next step will be the most crucial to the College’s advancement.
No matter how difficult the challenge, Morris hopes always to value two qualities in his work: honesty and integrity. He believes these are the values that made William Jewell successful, and, if continued, will make the College even more successful.