IAR24: Endowment and Split Interest Gifts Part 2

Kelli Perry joined the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute as the association vice president for finance and controller in September 2010. She serves as a key member of the senior finance team and is responsible for providing overall leadership for accounting services, financial reporting, disbursements, e-business (including travel management), systems, enterprise risk management, and operations. She has served in leadership roles in finance, administration, and student financial services. She brings a wide array of experience to her position, as she has had broader responsibility beyond finance, serving as the architect of a student financial services office, worked closely with information technology to implement a range of technology-based process improvements, supervised a budget office, human resources, and business services. She has also served in an acting vice president’s role, which has allowed her to interact with college leadership and serve on a president’s cabinet. Before focusing her efforts in higher education, she worked as an auditor for KPMG. Perry co-led the reengineering of Rensselaer’s procurement process utilizing e-commerce to improve customer service and achieve cost savings. She was also the lead on the travel management implementation that has significantly increased process efficiency and mitigated risk at Rensselaer. She is currently the chair of the enterprise risk management and student employment initiatives at Rensselaer and works closely with the outsourced internal audit function facilitating the relationship with campus.

Nicole Tirella, senior vice president, chief financial officer, and treasurer for Boston University oversees the financial operations including accounting and financial reporting, debt and treasury functions, research financial operations, risk management, sourcing and procurement, and internal audit. She is a certified public accountant and an active member of NACUBO's accounting principles council. She spent over seven years as an auditor for KPMG, specializing in higher education and not-for-profit entities. Before coming to Boston University, she was the associate controller at the University of Massachusetts within the president’s office where she led the compilation of the university system’s consolidated financial statements.

Mary Spina Wheeler is a project consultant for NACUBO and updates NACUBO’s Financial Accounting and Reporting Manual (FARM). She is also the owner of MS Wheeler Financial Services, LLC, providing financial and operational services to higher education and other nonprofit organizations. Wheeler writes and presents on all matters related to nonprofit and higher education accounting and financial reporting. She is the author of NACUBO’s Endowment Fund Valuation Guide and the 2012 recipient of NACUBO’s Daniel D. Robinson Award, recognizing outstanding contributions to the field of college and university accounting and reporting. Wheeler’s career includes management positions at Cornell University, St. Lawrence University, Skidmore College, Stevens Institute of Technology, and the Arizona State University Foundation.