United World Colleges is a unique global movement of 18 schools with a common mission to make education a force to unite people, nations and cultures for peace and a sustainable future. When UWC Thailand joined the movement in 2008, philanthropy became increasingly important to enable the school’s transformational work in Phuket.

The brief
UWC Thailand was originally founded by a single philanthropist, Klaus Hebben, and has, throughout its history, been supported by the generosity of parents. In August 2021 the school appointed Nicki Robertson as its first Chief Advancement Officer to build on UWC’s culture of service and harness philanthropy more consistently at the school. More Associate Partners Dave Shepherd and Joanna Storrar worked alongside Nicki to help build a scalable and sustainable fundraising operation for the future.

“I was a primary school teacher with leadership experience who moved into Advancement, and my role was the first full time philanthropy position at UWC Thailand,” said Nicki. “We wanted to start well and build a solid foundation to support philanthropy long-term. Dave and Joanna were the experienced hand to guide us and build our confidence to do it alone in future.”

Getting started
The More team began with a philanthropy readiness review of UWC Thailand’s narrative, audience, infrastructure, and leadership. From this, they developed a roadmap to scale up fundraising efforts and met biweekly with Nicki to support its implementation.

“We were building the plane while flying it, but Dave and Joanna kept us on task and focused when daily things could have distracted us”, said Nicki. “Dave's understanding of the UWC movement and international schooling systems was priceless and Joanna brought a welcome outside perspective to challenge our assumptions.”

Crafting a philanthropic narrative
“Fundraising works best when it flows from an organisation’s strategy,” explains Dave, “so we also ran a workshop with the school’s leadership to ask what they could do better and faster through philanthropy, or what philanthropy could enable that wouldn’t otherwise be possible. From that we helped build a case to inspire support.”

As a not-for-profit school founded by philanthropy, UWC Thailand had the foundations for a rich and compelling case for giving. The emerging narrative was built around the school’s Masterplan, which focused on scholarships as well as expanding key pillars of mindfulness, outdoor education, service and sustainability.

A roadmap to success
Throughout the three-year partnership with More, Joanna and Dave helped Nicki to develop the donor pipeline, select and introduce a new database to underpin enhanced regular and major giving programmes, launch UWC Thailand’s first annual fund, and put a stewardship programme in place to build stronger donor relationships. They also ran a coaching session with the Board and key volunteers to equip them with the skills and confidence to support fundraising at the school.

The impact
“Being the sole fundraiser can be lonely, but working with More has given me the confidence to believe in what I’m doing. I’ve learnt that whatever your size, you need to see the big picture and have all the pieces of the puzzle in place. More helped me do that. Dave and Joanna are the kindest and most caring people and their genuine interest in the work we do made it so much more impactful. We are so grateful for all that they have done for us and with us.”

Under Nicki’s leadership, UWC Thailand has successfully strengthened relationships with existing donors and established fresh programmes to attract new donors. Their generosity is now – among other things – enabling students from conflict zones such as Afghanistan and Kosovo to study in Phuket, and fostering refugee partnerships to provide life-changing educational opportunities for children from Uganda and Western Sahara.

To find out more about the bespoke support we could provide your organisation, contact us on info@morepartnership.com or 01382 224730.