Liz is the Director of Research Administration in the College of Education at The University of Texas at Austin. Liz is focused on developing resources and best practices to increase effectiveness and efficiency of research administration in the College of Education. Additionally, Liz leads the team of College of Education administrators in assisting faculty and students with proposal submissions, award negotiation, and unique post-award interpretations; working closely with office colleagues to effectively administer sponsored projects within the College of Education.

Liz is a founding member of the Association of Research Administrators (ARA) at The University of Texas at Austin. Liz also served as the National Council of University Research Administrators (NCURA) Region V Secretary from 2018 – 2020 and currently serves as NCURA Region V Chair-Elect, assisting NCURA Region V with executive leadership duties. With 15 years’ experience spanning the spectrum of research administration, Liz has supported research through preparing and providing educational tools and workshops; foundation matching and funding opportunity searches; proposal development, review, and submission; contract negotiation; complex post-award management; and detailed project reporting and audit compliance.

Kelsey has been a team member in the Texas Development community since September 2001. She joined the University Development Office in Winter 2017 as Executive Director of Corporate Relations. In this role, she and her team are responsible for helping connect the campus’s greatest assets (people and research) with the University’s top corporate partners to foster mutually beneficial collaborations and philanthropic investments. With an eye towards always developing trust and to helping companies formulate a targeted strategy for engagement with UT, Kelsey brings a breadth of the University’s technical and programmatic expertise to every conversation.

Prior to this role, Kelsey served as Chief Development Officer for the College of Natural Sciences’ External Relations team, where, from 2013-2017, she oversaw the fundraising, alumni and board relations and corporate research relations activity for the largest college at UT. She began her career at UT Austin in the Cockrell School of Engineering, where from 2001-2013, she served as a major gift officer, growing from an Assistant Director to Executive Director of Development. Throughout all her years at UT Austin, she has had the privilege of knowing and working with incredible donors, corporate partner, parents, and friends to help them navigate and fulfill their philanthropy.

Kelsey came to UT Austin from Georgia Tech, where she was the Director of Development for the Department of Chemical Engineering from 1999-2001. Before her time in Atlanta, Kelsey worked in Los Angeles, California for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles where she was Donor Services Coordinator for the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels. In all of her development positions, she has been proud to play a role in the success of the institutions she has served. Kelsey received her BA from the University of Arizona and lives in Austin, Texas with her husband, Scott, and their two children; son August (20 and an Aggie Engineer!) and daughter Avery (18 and a Texas State Bobcat!). She is an active member of the University-Industry Partnership network (UIDP), National Association of Corporate Relations Officers (NACRO), and the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE).

Leighton has over fourteen years of fundraising expertise, having raised over $100 million in funding.

He currently serves as the Chief Development Officer at The University of Texas at Austin’s LBJ School of Public Affairs. Prior to this role, he worked at The University of Texas at Austin’s College of Natural Sciences, LSU Health Shreveport Foundation, and Centenary College of Louisiana.

Leighton holds a Master of Science in Philanthropy and Fundraising from New York University’s George Heyman, Jr. Center for Philanthropy and Fundraising, a Master of Arts in Communication from Baylor University, and a Bachelor of Business Administration from Baylor University’s Hankamer School of Business.
His academic and professional journey reflects his commitment to the field of fundraising and higher education.

Cynthia is a Professor of Early Childhood Education and Policy in the Department of Leadership, Policy, and Organizations at Vanderbilt University’s Peabody College. She is the founder and executive director of the national Prenatal-to-3 Policy Impact Center, an academic research center that translates the science of the developing child into state level policies with the strongest evidence base of effectiveness.

Cynthia has also co-authored reports for the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine Committee on Building an Agenda to Reduce the Number of Children in Poverty by Half in 10 Years and Exploring the Opportunity Gap for Young Children from Birth to Age Eight. She holds a Ph.D. in demography and public affairs from Princeton University, a Master in Public Policy degree from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, and a Master of Arts in education from Claremont Graduate University.

After a successful career in trust and estate banking, Davida became the Director of Planned Giving and Endowments for WNET, the New York public television station. While at WNET, Davida produced training videos for distribution to the public broadcasting stations and began teaching planned giving at New York University. Her teaching career spanned 20 years until retirement in 2018 and included joining the faculty at Columbia University in addition to her being assistant professor at NYU. She has been a nationally recognized speaker on all aspects of planned giving. She served on the Board of the National Committee on Planned Giving and is now President Emeritus at the Philanthropic Planning Group of Greater New York (PPGGNY) from which she received an award for achievement in the planned giving community. In addition to continuing to present to development professionals, Davida is the Senior Philanthropic Advisor for The Seeing Eye, Inc. in Morristown, NJ.