impact on ALUMNI
Michael DeBlasi A Life of Service
Graduation Portrait New Hampshire College Torch Yearbook, 1970
When he retires in August after 40 years, Michael DeBlasi, the director of alumni and major gifts, will be leaving a career that has always been more than a job. “SNHU has been my life!!!” he wrote in a resume under the heading of “Previous Work History.” He wasn’t exaggerating. DeBlasi’s current position is his eighth with the university since his graduation in 1970 when the school was New Hampshire College. He spent 22 years in admissions, as counselor, associate director and assistant director. In 1992, DeBlasi made the transition to director of alumni and community relations; in 2005, he became director of alumni and donor relations; and in 2007, he was named director of alumni and major gifts. “My friends tell me I’m a relationship builder,” he says over coffee at a campus café near his office.
“Behind the Scenes” New Hampshire College Enterprise Yearbook, 1984
As director of alumni and major gifts, DeBlasi worked with the university’s Institutional Advancement Division, raising more than $250,000 annually. He managed a donor prospect portfolio of 150 people, created START, Students Today Alumni Relations Tomorrow, developed an Alumni Class Agent Program which had more than 150 alumni volunteers, and coordinated the SNHU President’s Cup Scholarship Golf Tournaments which has raised more than $500,000. The PC Tournament has been renamed the DeBlasi Cup in his honor. DeBlasi first saw the college in 1967 when it was located in several old buildings on Hanover Street in downtown Manchester. “We left Philadelphia at 1 a.m. to drive to New Hampshire for registration, and when we got there, we said, ‘Where’s the college?’ There was a small building with a narrow entryway and my parents asked me, ‘Are you sure you want to stay here?’ I’d come here sight unseen,” DeBlasi says. In his first years in Admissions, DeBlasi understood the importance of building relationships and reaching out. Robert Finlay, now head of R.J. Finlay & Company, says DeBlasi took a chance on him. “I met Mike DeBlasi when he was in admissions at New Hampshire College in 1989,” Finlay says. “I told him, ‘I don’t have the grades, but I promise if you give me a chance, I’ll do well.’” DeBlasi gave Finlay an ultimatum: take three summer courses and get Bs, or you don’t get in. “He tracked me down. He’d be chasing me, asking, ‘How are you doing in class? I owe the world to him,’” Finlay says. “Because I really believe it was because of that opportunity, that chance. There was a person who said, ‘I believe in you.’”
12
Impact
Fall 2010