College Hires Advancement Professional Debbie Bills

Debbie Bills recently joined the Harvey Mudd College Office of College Advancement staff as assistant vice president for advancement services. Bills succeeds Liz Baughman, who retires Dec. 5 after working at Harvey Mudd for 36 years.

Bills will oversee gift recording and prospect records, prospect research, programming, reporting and all advancement database functions for Harvey Mudd, including all policies and procedures related to data integrity, reliability and confidentiality. Because of her extensive experience in fundraising and planned giving, she also will oversee planned giving.

Bills worked previously at Caltech, where she most recently oversaw gift management and served as the business process lead in her capacity as director of information systems and services in the Office of Advancement. Bills also served as the interim manager of donor relations and helped oversee implementation efforts during Caltech’s database conversion. She also served as Caltech’s assistant director of planned giving and manager of trusts and bequests, in addition to being the liaison to the general counsel’s office and overseeing gift agreement protocol. Prior to joining Caltech, Bills directed the gift planning program at The Webb Schools and served as associate director of gift planning at Claremont Graduate University.

Bills earned her bachelor’s degree at Pomona College and is a certified specialist in planned giving. She is the current treasurer and a former president of the Partnership for Philanthropic Planning of Greater Los Angeles, a former Western Regional Planned Giving Conference co-chair and has served on the PPP-LA board for 10 years.