Executive Director of Planned Giving, WSU Foundation

Byron Rupp is the Executive Director of Planned Giving at Wichita State University Foundation and Alumni Engagement. His team focuses on developing new planned gifts and actively retaining them. Following graduation from Washburn University School of Law, Byron spent nearly twenty years in non-profit administration focusing primarily on pre-law and law students' academic and professional development. However, being part of a small shop, he inevitably inherited other duties, including fundraising, where he realized he'd found his true calling.

Following several years of focusing on annual fund, affinity development, and planned giving, Byron was asked to lead the advancement team at a small liberal arts college. While there, he led his team in completing a stagnant capital campaign that was already two years past its goal, designed and launched the quiet phase of a new campaign, and developed and implemented a prospect research program that resulted in the total number of new gifts as well as dollars raised for annual fund, major gifts, and planned gifts row for the first tie in more than five years. However, when offered the opportunity to focus solely on planned giving at Wichita State, he jumped at the chance and has been there since 2019. Byron earned the CFRE designation in 2020 and Texas Tech University's Graduate Certificate in Charitable Financial Planning with Dr. Russell James in 2024.