Jude Blake grew up watching her father, a man capable of living the high-life of financial success, keep grounded and give back to his community. His philanthropic spirit passed on to her through years of witnessing the differences he made for those around him.
After climbing the marketing and finance ladder — Blake held marketing executive positions at both General Mills and Pepsi Cola — she left the cut-throat world of corporate business and followed her father's footsteps into the world of philanthropy.
Her community and educational focused work earned her, as University of New Hampshire alumna of 1977, the Northeastern New England Chapter of the Association of Fundraising Professionals’ 2009 Outstanding Philanthropist of the Year award. The award was presented to her on Nov. 15.
“What I realized is that I really needed a personal life goal,” Blake said. “My goal was to do what I do really well for organizations and people who couldn’t afford me for my talent. So when I had the opportunity to give back, I started to do that.”
She now sits on a handful of boards at UNH, including the UNH Foundation’s Board of Directors, the Board of Trustees for the University System of New Hampshire, and the Whittemore School of Business and Economics’ Advisory Board and Executive Committee. The time and interaction with students both there and in the classroom—she teaches one course per semester, this semester on the wine of California—is where she finds the most gratification.
“I most passionately serve UNH and the university system,” Blake said. “That’s what I like the most, and that’s what I like to spend my time doing. No, I’m not compensated for most of it but I do it because I care and I love it.”
True philanthropy, according to Blake, isn’t simply giving money, but involves giving up oneself. She said in that, as opposed to her career in business finance and marketing, she felt the satisfaction of reaching that personal life goal.
Lauren Moye, a member of the National Philanthropy Day Awards Committee that reviewed Blake’s nomination, immediately recognized the good that Blake’s community had been feeling for years.
“We on the committee all felt that she is an energetic supporter, philanthropist, and volunteer, and we were thrilled to recognize her contributions,” Moye said.
Blake’s passion and energy, manifested in her choice of personal hero—Benjamin Franklin, who founded the first public university in the country, the University of Pennsylvania, where she got her master’s degree in finance—pushed her in the philanthropic direction of education and community.
Blake’s business savvy ways not only helps bring in money, but helps community organizations make the best financial maneuvers with it. Some of the organizations she's helped this way include the Children’s Museum of Dover, Cross Roads House, an organization that battles homelessness, Families First Health and Support Center, and the Music Hall of Portsmouth.
“I’m a marketer and I’m a strategic thinker, and I like to think about ways that they can leverage my gift to raise more money,” Blake said.
For example, her background in finance and marketing told her that the money she gave to Share Our Strengths, an organization that works to end childhood hunger, would be best used at their most recent fundraiser, Taste of the Seacoast, which she helped make much stronger.
Blake is especially energetic about the kind of investments that will continue to be beneficial—brick and mortar projects, she calls them.
Capital projects usually involve large sums of money and infrastructure-type construction, and are important because, according to Blake, it’s difficult to run functional programs without well-built facilities. She was instrumental in both the funding of and the push behind the Music Hall’s renovation of a part of the facility in which they run the children’s programs.
Despite the good she’s facilitated, Blake insists that the true philanthropists are those who work every day at bringing in funds—doing the grunt work, the work that gets hands dirty and makes backs sore.
“I think that the people of the Foundation staff at UNH and all the development people who are raising money for not-for-profits in our community, I think the tribute should be for them,” Blake said. “Because it’s really about the work they do that keeps people like me engaged.”
Sarah Gnerre, director of the Peter T. Paul Challenge at the UNH Foundation—now referred to as the office of University Advancement—is a staff member of the fundraising community that has what is, according to Blake, a “thankless job.”
But Gnerre is the one handing out thanks when it comes to Blake.
“People like Jude make our fundraising work very meaningful and very fulfilling,” Gnerre said. “I feel like the luckiest person in the world to get to call on a person like Jude. She’s a very energetic and enthusiastic supporter of the university.”
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