ABOUT DEVELOPMENT AND ALUMNI ENGAGEMENT
The UC Riverside Development and Alumni Engagement team raises public awareness of UCR's excellence in research, teaching and service. DAE encourages, promotes, and secures public and private resources to support:
- Recruitment and retention of world-class faculty.
- High-quality education for the best and brightest students who are reflective
of California's diverse population. - Leading-edge facilities and equipment necessary for inquiry and the creation
of knowledge for the 21st century and beyond.
ABOUT OUR VICE CHANCELLOR
Vice Chancellor Travis M. Smith
Travis M. Smith is vice chancellor of Development and Alumni Engagement at UC Riverside (UCR), where he oversees Development, Alumni Engagement, and Administrative Services. Smith also serves as President of the UCR Foundation.
Smith's passion and enthusiasm for America's public research universities has been cultivated at three prior institutions over the past two decades. Prior to joining UC Riverside, he served as Senior Vice President for Central Development at the University of Minnesota Foundation (UMF). At Minnesota, Smith was an integral part of the university-wide Driven Campaign, which concluded in 2021 having raised $4.4 billion. As a key member of UMF's senior leadership team, Smith helped guide UMF to a record-setting $538 million in philanthropic giving for fiscal year 2026.
Smith began his fund-raising career with the Oregon State University Foundation, where he held a number of progressively responsible positions, including Director of Development for the Colleges of Business and Education. From 2013-15, he was Senior Director of Regional Advancement at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
In 2015, he became Assistant Dean for Institutional Advancement at Minnesota Carlson, the University of Minnesota's business school. At Carlson, Smith served as principal architect of the school's campaign, which raised more than $190 million from nearly 13,000 donors. In 2019, Smith joined UMF as Associate Vice President for Principal Gifts and Campus Programs where he designed a nationally recognized principal gift program and helped secure a number of UMN's largest ever gifts. He became Senior Vice President in July 2024, leading a collection of centralized development programs along with a number of collegiate-based programs.
Highly respected as an advancement industry thought leader, Smith's collaborative, results-oriented approach to leadership focuses on creating outstanding donor outcomes by fully integrating faculty, staff, and students as part of the advancement process.
Smith, a native of the Central Valley of California, is a first-generation college graduate. He received his B.A. in business administration from the University of Oregon, and his MBA from the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota.