Nikki Neely Davis (left), Denson Hollis and Lauren Beyers have been promoted to senior-level leadership positions in the Office of Development, the unit charged with securing private gifts to support the academic community. UM photo by Bill Dabney

OXFORD, Miss. – Three experienced fundraising and strategic planning professionals in the University of Mississippi Office of Development have been promoted to new leadership positions and charged with attracting private gifts to support academic excellence.

Denson Hollis and Nikki Neely Davis, who were previously senior development officers for the College of Liberal Arts, have been named development directors. Both will work closely with Chancellor Jeffrey Vitter and supervise development officers assigned to schools across campus and to the College of Liberal Arts.

Lauren Beyers, prospect research manager, is the new philanthropy services director, overseeing several Office of Development units and support personnel.

“It is crucial that our flagship university be supported by a high-performing fundraising team with the talent to build enduring relationships with Ole Miss alumni and friends and to encourage investments in academics,” Vitter said.

“Denson, Nikki and Lauren are steadfast in their efforts to attract major gifts at a time when UM must generate almost 90 percent of its operating revenue from sources other than state funding. They will help take our university to higher levels of excellence. We are grateful for these talented professionals, as well as for our extremely generous and loyal donors.”

The Office of Development is responsible for encouraging active participation by alumni, parents, friends, corporations and foundations, and matching their interests and passions with university needs, including resources for scholarships, faculty, academic programs, research and libraries.

Efforts from this department, combined with those of the UM Foundation, UM Medical Center Development and the Ole Miss Athletics Foundation, resulted in $194.3 million in private gifts during fiscal year 2016, the fifth consecutive year private giving exceeded $100 million.

Just months after his tenure began, Vitter charged Alice Clark, vice chancellor for university relations, and Robin Buchannon, associate vice chancellor, with a review of the development office’s structure. That work began in March 2016 and has culminated with these promotions, as well as a national search for the first-ever vice chancellor for development – a search that is ongoing, with Clark leading the search committee chair.

“Our oversight of development included evaluating organizational structures of peer institutions, working with an independent consultant and reviewing previous recommendations for our development office offered by a consultant that studied our capital campaign readiness,” Buchannon said. “We feel we have implemented a structure that will better support our successful fundraising team and allow for future growth opportunities.

“From the outset, Denson, Nikki and Lauren were recognized as strong directors who consistently developed new strategies and built both internal and external relationships to propel the university forward.”

Hollis and Davis, who were called upon to work closely and travel with Vitter more than a year ago on an interim basis, will continue this senior-level work as development directors. The two have been serving as development officers for the College of Liberal Arts, helping strengthen all the programs and centers under the CLA umbrella.

They will continue to supervise all development officers for the college and schools across the Oxford campus, as well as development officers who work with family and parent leadership and with corporations and foundations.

Hollis joined the development office eight years ago and has since received promotions that reflect his proven success in securing major gifts and building enduring relationships with UM alumni and friends. He holds a bachelor’s degree in political science from Ole Miss and a master’s degree in sports management from Georgia Southern University.

Davis joined the development office five years ago and, likewise, has earned promotions based on her performance with and vision for fundraising. She was previously with Emory University as associate director of foundation and corporate relations. She holds a bachelor’s degree in art and a master’s degree in journalism, both from Ole Miss.

As philanthropy services director, Beyers is part of the senior leadership team that will establish and implement the vision, mission and goals of development and philanthropy services. She will direct and manage the priorities of staff members within the areas of prospect research, annual giving, communications, Ole Miss First, Ole Miss Women’s Council, and operations and fiscal functions.

An 11-year employee, Beyers has served as the director of prospect management and research since 2008 and was a prospect research analyst for the previous two years.

She is responsible for innovative approaches to implementing analytical solutions; creating systems, reports and performance metrics; building an employee training program; and establishing policy for major gifts and annual giving. Her work with prospect management and research includes integrating analytics and tools to improve decisionmaking and work-flow efficiencies, delivering greater insights with data and supporting strategic thinking across the development team.

In 2000, Beyers earned an undergraduate degree in managerial finance from the UM School of Business Administration. She then developed expertise as an analyst in the energy sector of Houston, Texas, before joining the UM staff in 2006.

George Colvin Cochran

OXFORD, Miss. – George Colvin Cochran, a 45-year law professor at the University of Mississippi, died Monday (June 19) at the age of 80 from complications of melanoma.

An educator and civil rights scholar, Cochran leaves a singular, enduring legacy with the School of Law and a half-century’s worth of its graduates.

“It is hard to imagine the law school without George Cochran,” said Debbie Bell, the school’s interim dean. “His students remember him for his intense, challenging classes and his amazing memory of materials and cases.

“Over the years, he was quietly generous to students in need, a fact a number of our graduates have mentioned to me in the last two years.”

Visitation is scheduled for 5 to 7 p.m. Thursday (June 22) in West Hall at Waller Funeral Home in Oxford, and services will be at 11 a.m. Friday (June 23), also at Waller Funeral Home. In honor of Cochran’s service to our country, the flag of the U.S. Army will be flown.

A campus memorial service and celebration will be planned later.

Cochran was born Dec. 1, 1936 in Maysville, Kentucky. He graduated from Cranbrook School in Michigan and from North Carolina State, where he studied textile engineering, played football and was active in student politics.

In his early 20s, Cochran worked briefly for his family’s Kentucky textile mill before serving two years as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army Airborne infantry at Fort Benning, Georgia.

Cochran graduated first in his class from the University of North Carolina Law School and served as editor-in-chief of the law review. He was inducted into the Order of the Coif, the premier legal honor society.

He clerked for U.S. Supreme Court justices Stanley Reed and Earl Warren, including service on the President’s Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy.

Cochran practiced law with Steptoe and Johnson between 1966 and1968. That year, he and his wife, Nancy Newbold Cochran, welcomed his only child, daughter Reed. Though he and Nancy ultimately divorced, Cochran considered her to be his greatest love and their daughter to be his crowning accomplishment.

Cochran worked as director of the Duke Center on Law and Poverty from 1968 to ’72, when he accepted a faculty position at the UM School of Law. Here, he found his true calling as educator and scholar.

Cochran arrived in Oxford while Mississippi was still resisting the outcomes of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, the Legislature having expelled faculty members who supported the Supreme Court decision.

As one writer has observed, “Professor Cochran joined the law faculty at a turning point. From early in his career, he played an important role in transforming the law school from a parochial institution into a nationally respected” law school.

He taught constitutional law, federal jurisdiction, Supreme Court practice and related seminars. For 19 years, he also taught during summers at Fordham Law School in New York.

Also in New York, he collaborated with the Center for Constitutional Rights, considering one of its founders, Morton Stavis, to be among his greatest friends and mentors.

Altogether, Cochran was attorney of record in 17 constitutional law cases. He and his good friend Wilbur Colom successfully challenged single-sex education at Mississippi public universities in the U.S. Supreme Court.

Cochran was also one of the nation’s leading experts opposing punitive actions against public interest attorneys. And he was instrumental in establishing the Mississippi Innocence Project, which was renamed the George C. Cochran Innocence Project by unanimous vote of the faculty in 2015.

To his students, Cochran was best known for his spirited and provocative lectures on constitutional law, civil liberties and, especially, free speech. Former Mississippi Supreme Court Justice Oliver Diaz, one of his students, wrote, “He offended liberals and conservatives alike. He taught us that the price for living in a free society is that we will be offended. Get over it. This is what democracy does. We can’t be frightened by speech.”

While the professor was notorious for his gruff demeanor and salty language, Cochran’s students never doubted his devotion. He continued teaching after retirement, through this spring. Indeed, he was in the classroom only a few weeks before his passing.

Cochran’s favorite hobby was sailing. He and Nancy owned “Young Tiger” in the early years of their marriage on the Chesapeake Bay. Later, he and Colom would sail “Misty” to Cuba, by legal invitation, with their daughters Reed and Niani among the crew.

Cochran is survived by his daughter, Reed Cochran; his sister, Frances Cochran Sanders; niece, Ann Sanders Anderson-Behrend; and nephews William Henley Sanders, John Poyntz Cochran and William Duffield Cochran IV.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the University of Mississippi Foundation, 406 University Ave., Oxford, MS 38655, designated for the George C. Cochran Scholarship in Law Endowment or to the George Cochran Innocence Project.

OXFORD, Miss. – Due to the threat of inclement weather from Tropical Storm Cindy, the Governor’s Concert on Saturday (June 24) at the Mississippi Bicentennial Celebration North will return to its original location, the Gertrude C. Ford Center for the Performing Arts at the University of Mississippi.

“Safety is our priority,” Gov. Phil Bryant said. “The decision to move the concert indoors to the Ford Center will allow us to celebrate Mississippi’s bicentennial in north Mississippi as planned, despite the rainy forecast.”

Tickets originally issued for the Bicentennial Celebration North Governor’s Concert will not be valid at Saturday’s event. Through email notification, original ticket holders have a 24-hour advance window to claim new tickets, from noon today to noon Thursday. After that window, any remaining tickets will be available free to the general public through http://www.visitmississippi.org/200.

Doors at the Ford Center open at 6 p.m. Saturday, and the Governor’s Concert begins at 6:30 p.m.

Country and Americana legend Marty Stuart will headline the concert, appearing along with hit singer-songwriter Mac McAnally, Mississippi’s Music and Culture Ambassador Steve Azar and Shannon McNally.

“We Are Mississippi,” a salute to the state’s musical heritage conducted by Jay Dean, executive director of the Arts Institute of Mississippi, will lead off the festivities. The showcase includes Vasti Jackson, the Roots Gospel Voices of Mississippi, 2015 Ultimate Elvis Tribute Contest winner David Lee, the Mississippi Bicentennial Symphony Orchestra and the Mississippi Bicentennial Singers.

Other events during the Bicentennial Celebration North are also affected by the expected weather.

The “Thacker Mountain Radio” show’s live taping at 7 p.m. Friday (June 23) will move to the Lyric Theater, with seats available on a first-come, first-served basis, followed by the Mississippi Soul Singer Tribute Concert with Damein Wash.

Events scheduled for Sunday (June 25) in the Grove are cancelled, but Blackwater Trio will perform at 5 p.m. at the Powerhouse Community Arts Center in Oxford, with food trucks on site.

Mississippi Bicentennial Celebration events also are planned for Dec. 9 in Jackson during the grand opening of the Museum of Mississippi History and the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum.