Kevin J. Lee of Belleville has been named director of institutional advancement at Aquinas Institute of Theology in Midtown St. Louis.

Lee, who has been associate director of admissions at Aquinas Institute, will oversee the fund-raising efforts at the graduate school. His priorities will include raising money to endow four faculty chairs, bolstering scholarship funds for seminarians, vowed religious and laypeople, and increasing annual giving.

Key to meeting those challenges will be raising awareness about the school, Lee said.

“It is the overall challenge facing Catholic seminaries and all Christian seminaries,” he said. “We must educate people about our relevance.”

Lee succeeds Marcus Watson, who joined Aquinas Institute in January 2003 and returned recently to his home in Baton Rouge, La.

Aquinas Institute of Theology is a Roman Catholic graduate school on the campus of Saint Louis University. The Order of Preachers sponsors the school, which educates candidates for the priesthood, vowed religious sisters and brothers, and laypeople pursuing careers in ministry or seeking to better understand their faith lives and faith tradition.

Alumni who do not seek ordination assume roles as campus ministers, for example, theology teachers, managers of parishes without resident priests and hospital chaplains.