The Board of Directors Award recognizes outstanding achievements by advancement staff in applying creative concepts to improving performance, advancing fundraising efforts and promoting a better understanding of the university-wide major gift fundraising activities. It is the most prestigious award a Foundation employee can receive.

Congratulations to the 2022 recipients!

Brian Broyles
Executive Director, Regional Advancement
UT Knoxville

In his eight years with the UT Foundation, Broyles has excelled through each challenge he has faced, and that success has helped him rise through the advancement team at UT Knoxville. Throughout this fiscal year, he has helped lead the regional team to the highest dollars raised at $72.8 million. Working collaboratively, Broyles raised significant dollars for multiple colleges and units, and leads by example through his emphasis on building positive relationships with peers across the campus as well as alumni. He has been personally responsible for $61 million raised over the past two fiscal years, and he is an extremely important contributor to the yearly fundraising success of his campus and the UT Foundation.

Darren Hughes
Director of User Experience
Central Services

Hughes has served as the project manager for the UT Foundation’s transition to a new CRM. To begin the process, he implemented a needs assessment committee that utilized staff, volunteers, donors and alumni to determine business needs throughout UTFI. The findings from this committee built out use case scenarios that were used throughout the vendor demonstrations. This provided staff a full view of the capabilities of each vendor. Now, as we prepare to implement ACE, Hughes is leading the charge and using the business needs discovery and change management strategies to build a smooth transition by February 2024.

Jackie Johnson
Assistant Vice Chancellor for Alumni and Annual Giving
UT Martin

Her colleagues at UT Martin describe Johnson as a great leader, personable, visionary, motivated and dedicated. Her vision during the pandemic led to the creation of the UTM Engagement Center in fall 2021. This effort has led to greater engagement with alumni as well as providing opportunities to enlighten current students about the need to support the campus after graduation. Her efforts helped their team surpass the fiscal year alumni engagement goal in month seven. In addition, Johnson serves on several task forces internally and externally to represent the needs of UT Martin and utilizes her knowledge of the campus and the relationships she has established as resources to call upon as she provides leadership to her department.