I AM UAA: Chrissy Bell

B.A. English '01
Hometown: Nikiski, Alaska
Fun fact: Met her husband their last semester at UAA

When Chrissy Bell was still Chrissy Colucci, her trajectory was set at becoming a high school English teacher. She stayed close to home her first three years of college at UAA's Kenai Peninsula College in order to minimize costs, but degree requirements her senior year necessitated she finish up on UAA's main campus in Anchorage. Little did she know at the time that the move north would also alter her course from teaching to fundraising and volunteerism.

Chrissy was always one to hold down a job while taking classes so she began work her senior year at the Anchorage Museum in their development office.

"Once I got into it, I realized I loved fundraising," she says. "I realized that development was my path instead of teaching."

After graduation, she stayed at the museum for another year and then moved on to the Boys and Girls Club for two years to coordinate their special events. Then she stepped into the development director position at Alaskan AIDS Assistance Association (Four A's), where she stayed for six and a half years. Since 2010, she has been with Credit Union 1 overseeing their community service efforts and financial education programs.

"I love my job at Credit Union 1 because I get to have my feet on both sides of philanthropy: fundraising and giving," she says, describing projects like the West High School Learning Lab that brings financial education to teenagers and the One For All Alaska Fund that is an internal campaign to raise funds for local organizations at each of the Credit Union 1 branches.

Now the president of the Alaska Chapter of the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP), where she's been a member since 2003, Chrissy has clearly settled into her niche and developed a philosophy on what it takes to be a philanthropist.

It's easy, she insists.

"I firmly believe that anyone can be a philanthropist," she says. "It's not an amount [of time or money] that earns someone that label, it's the intent behind it. There is a lot of change that can happen based on good, collective community intent."

Organizations that are dear to her own heart include the Four A's, Out North Contemporary Art House, Junior Achievement of Alaska and the American Cancer Society. In fact, she jokes that her and her husband's hobbies include nonprofit work.

"I'm on three boards and he's very avid with STAR Crisis Line," she says. "Volunteerism is what we spend a lot of our free time doing."

She found a soul mate in her husband, Shannon Bell, when they met their last semester at UAA in a professional writing class. He was a history major and later came back for his master's in social work. He now works as a mental health therapist with Alaska Children's Services. They were partners on a project for the writing class, were engaged shortly thereafter and married six months later. "I very much credit UAA with meeting my husband," Chrissy laughs.

Outside of volunteering and fundraising, Chrissy has also started to get back into writing poetry. And a recent poetry class through 49 Writers Center has turned into a small writing group that keeps her engaged with her craft.

"That has been really refreshing," she says of reconnecting with her creative writing roots. "For the past 10 years I have utilized mainly technical writing and to be able to re-open that creativity has been good for me. However, my English degree is actually pretty universal in many aspects of the development field."

And there are some capacities of her various job and board roles that allow her to teach as well.

"I do feel like I am on the path I was meant to be on," she said. "No regrets."