Robert S. Shepard has been reappointed to a five-year term as vice president for alumni affairs and development at Duke University, President Richard H. Brodhead announced Thursday.
Shepard, who came to Duke as executive director of development in 1995, was named vice president for development in 1998 and assumed his current post as the university's chief fundraising and alumni relations officer in 2004.
"Bob Shepard is a great colleague, a strategic thinker and a masterful ambassador for Duke," Brodhead said. "He understands both our priorities and our unique spirit, and can make the many members of the Duke community see, and support, the unbounded potential of this university."
Shepard oversees the Office of University Development, which manages all central fundraising activities, and the Office of Alumni Affairs, which serves the Duke Alumni Association's 135,000 members in more than 100 alumni clubs on six continents and publishes the award-winning Duke Magazine.
Duke's annual fundraising totals are among the nation's highest. Those totals have increased in each of Shepard's four full years of leadership, with the last one, 2007-08, bringing in a university record $385.7 million in charitable gifts from more than 102,000 donors.
Shepard also oversaw Duke's successful Financial Aid Initiative. The initiative, begun in January 2005 and publicly launched that December, set a goal of raising at least $300 million in new endowment for financial aid by Dec. 31, 2008. The effort surpassed that mark ahead of schedule, with a final tally of more than $308 million.
Earlier, Shepard was a leader of the Campaign for Duke, which raised $2.36 billion between Jan. 1, 1996, and Dec. 31, 2003. It was the largest fundraising campaign in Duke history and at the time the fifth-largest in the history of American higher education.
Duke regularly conducts five-year reviews of deans and senior administrative positions, and Shepard's recommendation for reappointment follows an evaluation by a committee of faculty and staff, chaired by James Siedow, vice provost for research. In its report, the committee praised Shepard for earning the trust and respect of donors and academic leaders alike, and for assembling a talented and effective leadership team.
Before coming to Duke, Shepard was vice dean of external affairs at the University of Pennsylvania's School of Arts and Sciences, and associate director of the Campaign for Penn. He also served as chief development officer at Roosevelt University in Chicago.
Shepard earned a doctorate at the University of Chicago and also holds degrees from the University of Iowa and Trinity College.