Paul M. Gardner, Ph.D., CFRE
Paul brings over 40 years of “in the trenches” fundraising experience to our clients. He has served a variety of organizations, including schools, colleges and universities, retirement and long term care organizations, international development agencies, health care, youth agencies, arts organizations, and numerous churches. He has been a part of capital campaigns whose combined goals exceed $350 million. Having lived and worked in Arkansas for over 25 years, Paul is well known in Arkansas’ not-for-profit industry.
Paul has served in the Development Office of Harding University working with major gifts, alumni development, and annual giving. He also served as Vice-President for Institutional Advancement at Ohio Valley University and Director of Resource Development at Heifer Project International. He served as associate Vice Chancellor at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) and as the Executive Director of the Arkansas Cancer Research Center Foundation at UAMS.
Paul is active at the national level in the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) and is the past treasurer of that national body. He is past president of the Arkansas Chapter of AFP and has the distinction of being named by colleagues in 1994 as Arkansas’ Outstanding Fund Raising Executive. He recently completed service on the national board of the AFP Foundation.
He is a graduate of Harding University and West Virginia University. His doctorate is from Ohio University. Paul and his wife Mary live in Searcy, Arkansas.
Walt Eilers
Walt Eilers is Gardner & Associates Senior Associate. He provides full-service fundraising and development consulting services. Walt brings twelve years of fundraising experience to the firm. He specializes in grant writing, feasibility and needs assessment research, non-profit board development, team development and strategic planning. He is actively supervising fundraising projects with Northeastern State University, West Texas A&M University, Let’s Bring Them Home, Partners for Better Housing and Food Bank of North Central Arkansas.
Walt is applying his organizational skills as the President of the Botanical Gardens of the Ozarks.
Why Gardner?
Welcome to Gardner & Associates! You may ask, “Why Gardner?” We specialize in “Growing philanthropy.”
G&A encourages their clients to consider four innovations:
1. Serve as “a community change agent.” Collaborate with groups outside your NPO in new partnerships to generate transformational change.
2. Use technology to segment communications, enhance productivity, ensure accuracy and simplify operations.
3. Encourage innovation in your projects and daily operational structures to differentiate your NPO.
4. Assess your NPO’s leadership and operations to encourage flexibility to seek creative solutions to address the challenges of the New Economy.
When Paul Gardner and Walt Eilers assist you and your NPO, we provide a customized solution for your philanthropic need. With over fifty combined years of fundraising consulting we bring both experience and innovation to your campaign.
We can help in many ways:
• Cultivate awareness of your NPO’s mission
• Prune overhead
• Eliminate bad habits
• Harvest accomplished goals
• Grow your organization
• Nurture prospects
• Foster board members and volunteers
• Dig yourself out of a hole
• Swell your planned giving
• Breed new grants
• Plow new ground
• Strengthen your database
Gardner & Associates (G&A) was founded in 2008 by Dr. Paul Gardner to provide a full range of fundraising consulting to a variety of organizations, including schools, colleges and universities, retirement and long term care organizations, international development agencies, health care, youth agencies and arts organizations.
Specialties of G&A include needs assessment, strategic planning, campaign research and technology applications to enhance campaign results and to define donor motivations. Most recently, and especially in the current economic environment, G&A believes that collaboration among like kind not-for- profit organizations is very important, and has experience in this arena.