Each year, the Giving USA report sets the agenda for how American fundraisers understand the year ahead. But the national headline numbers only tell part of the story — what matters is how those trends play out across the very different corners of our sector.
Join AFP Minnesota for a candid morning conversation with fundraising leaders representing distinct vantage points across the philanthropic ecosystem. We'll move past the topline data and into the questions that actually shape strategy: Where are donors showing up — and where are they pulling back. How are higher education, healthcare-focused national nonprofits, and other major institutions responding to the same signals in very different ways? What should fundraisers and nonprofits be doing differently in the second half of 2026?
Bring your questions. Leave with a sharper read on what's coming, and a stronger network of peers thinking through the same challenges.
Featured Panelists
Carley Stuber Assistant Vice President of Development, Macalester College.
Carley leads development at Macalester College, a top-ranked liberal arts institution with a long tradition of philanthropic engagement from alumni, parents, and foundations. Her career spans major arts and cultural institutions, including the Minnesota Opera, giving her a rare cross-sector perspective on how donors engage with mission-driven organizations. She brings a higher education and institutional advancement lens to the conversation and is a past AFP Minnesota Chapter President.
Anthony Bass, M.Div., MBA, MPA, Ed.D. Vice President, American Cancer Society.
Anthony brings more than 20 years of nonprofit leadership experience to his role at the American Cancer Society, where he leads major fundraising and community engagement work across the region. His career includes leadership roles at Greater Twin Cities United Way and pastoral ministry, and he is an NFL Alumni member with a Doctor of Education in Urban Education and Leadership from Hamline University. Anthony offers the perspective of a large, mission-driven national nonprofit navigating donor behavior, corporate partnerships, and the future of cause-based giving.
Maggie McCracken Vice President, Philanthropic Strategy & Engagement, Minneapolis Foundation.
Maggie brings more than 20 years of experience in both the for-profit and nonprofit sectors. Before joining the Foundation in 2022, she spent over a decade in marketing and strategic planning roles at Target Corporation. She then served as the CEO of The BrandLab, a nonprofit working to support talent of color by removing barriers to marketing and advertising careers in the Midwest. Maggie is passionate about connecting resources to propel missions. She’s a first-generation college graduate with a bachelor’s degree from Indiana University. She brings the perspective of a community foundation working alongside more than 1,000 donor-advised fundholders (DAFs) to move resources into communities with greater urgency.
Amy Podlesak Senior Community Impact Manager, Land O'Lakes, Inc.
Amy is the Senior Community Impact Manager at Land O’Lakes, Inc., where she leads efforts to strengthen urban and rural communities through strategic philanthropy. In this position, she manages corporate and foundation giving programs and plays a key role shaping strategy, partnerships, and communications. With more than a decade of experience in philanthropy and fundraising, Amy has built and managed relationships with nonprofits, led enterprise-wide giving campaigns, and launched innovative grantmaking and engagement programs. Prior to Land O’Lakes, she held development and corporate relations roles with Junior Achievement North and the University of Minnesota. Amy is passionate about strengthening communities through collaboration, data-driven planning, and storytelling, and remains actively engaged through nonprofit board service and volunteering in the Twin Cities.
Moderator
Frank Mumford, CFRE Senior Account Executive, Avid
Frank believes the most powerful force in advancing a mission has never been technology alone. It's what happens when people and technology work together. Across more than 14 years in the nonprofit sector, that conviction has been the thread running through everything he's done. As a major gifts fundraiser, he saw firsthand that the right insight at the right moment could transform a relationship, unlock generosity, and let an organization do more for the people and causes it serves. Technology, used well, didn't replace that human work. It amplified it.
That belief is what drew Frank into the tech-for-good space. As a Senior Account Executive at Avid, he helps mission-driven organizations adopt the Fundraising Operating System, not as a tool for its own sake, but as a way to free fundraisers to do their best, most human work: building relationships, telling stories, and expanding what their missions can reach. Every organization he partners with represents the same question that has always motivated him. How do we help good people do more good, faster? He's based in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area, and he's just getting started.