alumni futures

Alumni Engagement Blog: Add Your Voice

For a session scheduled for the CASE Summit in a couple of weeks, three presenters have created a blog to gather input on their topic and provide information about their ideas.

The presenters are

• Susan Anderson, Director of Alumni and Parent Relations at the California State University, Chico
• Peter Smits, Vice President for University Advancement, California State University, Fresno and Executive Director, Fresno State Foundation, and
• Robert Shoss, Founder and President of Performance Enhancement Group, Ltd. 

Their session (at 10:45 a.m. on Friday, July 10) is about "strategic trends in alumni engagement," a topic they say 

is particularly relevant today because institutional leaders are more concerned than ever about how to connect with and better engage their alumni.

As of this writing, there were 28 comments on their blog, showing a wide variety of approaches to alumni engagement, and (for better or worse) a wide variation in perceptions of what social media might accomplish, and how. The presenters are to be commended for replying to every comment so far; they now have the opportunity to challenge some of the conventional wisdom about the tools we're all trying to learn to deploy.

You too can provide input and add relevance to the discussion: simply follow the link below and leave some feedback. Note that you don't need to attend the Summit to participate in the discussion. That's one of the important features of a blog – the discussion will ultimately continue independent of the conference, which will soon be history, after all.

Visit the blog and tell them what you think: 

http://alumniengagement.wordpress.com/

Sue, Peter and Rob suggest some questions you can respond to:

• Are you engaging your alumni differently today than you were a year ago?
• How are you using social media to engage your alumni?
• Are dues-paying association members more engaged than non-dues-paying members?
• Do you use alumni opinions as a key part of your strategies? If so, how?

The presenters promise to provide a summary of the session's highlights after the conference, and with your input the discussion can continue.

Twitter users: 

The hashtag for the conference is: #casesummit

The presenters are on Twitter as @alumengagement

How Not To Find Lost Alumni

The other day I mentioned that AlumTweet could theoretically help you find lost alumni, but that its value might not outweigh some of its risks or shortcomings. This reminded me to comment about another, more typical way of searching for lost alumni.

The search for lost alumni is a priority of many new alumni directors and advancement vice presidents. After all, more alumni in the database means more contact, and more fundraising opportunities.

As a result, alumni association web pages are peppered with well-intentioned listings of "lost alumni" - graduates whose names have no corresponding mailing or email address and no telephone number in the alumni database. (Image at right)

I believe that listing lost alumni on your web site is a security risk – and a potential privacy violation waiting to happen. 

Why? 

Human nature. 

Your advancement office probably has policies designed to protect alumni contact information, but it also has well-meaning, helpful staff members. Putting a policy in place cannot stop someone from providing alumni directory log in credentials to someone who contacts the office and says, "I'm on your list of lost alumni and I'd like to use the directory and update my record. Can you please tell me my user ID and password?"

If this happens just once, you've created a security risk. Providing access to the alumni directory without verifying identification (e.g., by insisting on phone contact and asking for details from the person's alumni record – such as major subject of study, or an advisor's name) means risking the exposure of private alumni contact information to a spammer or a stalker.

My own experience is that these public lists of lost alumni generate extremely small numbers of updated records. In my opinion the risk outweighs the benefit.

If you disagree, or have experience with this practice, leave a comment.

Will AlumTweet Help You Find Alumni or Classmates?

Several colleagues sent me a link this past week to a new Twitter-related service called AlumTweet. 

You give AlumTweet the name of your high school and your college, plus the year in which you graduated from each one. The service then generates a tweet (i.e., a message sent via Twitter) from you that says something like

Just added myself to http://alumtweet.com - Central High School '82 and State University '86

In your case, it would insert the name of the high school and the college you self-identify as your own. You can edit the message too. Next, you log in to Twitter from the AlumTweet site and the message goes out. Then you can view any other alumni (or current students) who have registered from your schools – or from other schools in your US state. If there are any. And you can click their profile and view their Twitter page.

AlumTweet is appealing, at first glance, to those of us trying to figure out how to use Twitter to connect alumni with one another. I have not pondered AlumTweet's model deeply, but it strikes me there are a few pros and several cons of the AlumTweet model. 

On the plus side, you might find the last three people from high school who haven't become your "friend" on Facebook. And, in case it was of any interest to your Twitter followers, you could broadcast the name of your high school and college to them. And if you're a hard-working advancement pro trying to find "lost alumni" there's a small chance a missing one might turn up on Twitter. (Not sure what you would do then... would you follow them on Twitter, and if they follow you back, send them a Direct Message asking for their email address?)

Potential negatives:

• Anyone can select any school from the high school or college list. There's no verification or authentication of any kind.
• Unless you select a high school, the earliest college class year you can select is 1995.
• The system doesn't seem to "know" (or care) whether your purported college existed when you say you graduated. A quick test shows that one could, for example, claim to have graduated from Cal State Channel Islands in 1982 – twenty years before it opened.
• You can edit the message announcing that you're using AlumTweet, but even if you remove your school name and class year, they will be published for others to see on the AlumTweet site.
• You have to submit your Twitter username and password to AlumTweet. (Click image to open in new window:) 

  

For me, the last point – third-party log in – is the deal-breaker. Not because AlumTweet won't guard your information. They might – I have no way of knowing. And that's the point. 

Everyone should be careful when entering web service log in credentials on third-party sites. The same openness to third-party developers that makes Twitter easy and fun to use also makes it vulnerable to security bugs or misdeeds. Others (with way more technical know-how than me) have documented such flaws and weaknesses.

So until some of these authentication issues are worked out, I personally will steer clear of most such services. But for those of you who dive in and try the service, I'd be interested to know whether you find other alumni – and find the service worthwhile.

Thanks to everyone who sent me a note about AlumTweet.

Additional Links:

Interfolio's follow up to this posting

Brad Ward's blog posting about AlumTweet

University of Colorado: Mandatory Student Fee for Alumni Dues

On June 8, the Chronicle of Higher Education [subscription required] carried a story about plans at the University of Colorado to implement a new funding scheme to support alumni activities. 

Starting with this fall's freshman class, the university system's alumni association will be requiring students to pay a lifetime-membership fee of $70 when they enroll. Under the association's previous model, [alumni] were asked for $45 annually only after they graduated. 

The story is quite brief and doesn't clearly explain how administrators arrived at this model. Obviously, charging students one more fee, using existing billing and payment systems, is an easy way to generate cash without the overhead of a dues program. Collecting association dues ordinarily requires staff members to track annual payments, generate renewal notices, and monitor the administration of benefits.

The alumni association's interim director, Ron Stump is quoted as saying that "students can know they won't be solicited for the rest of their lives." Maybe, but this assumes that it would ever occur to a student that they'd have to pay dues in the first place. I'm not sure it will feel like a favor when the fee gets tagged on to the tuition, the room, and the board plan. Most students may not even know they've "joined" anything – because they haven't.

Also, most students and many alumni don't know the difference between an alumni association and a development office or foundation. So there's some chance that alumni who thought they wouldn't be solicited "for the rest of their lives" may be confused (or even resentful) when they are asked to donate to the university later on.

Stump meanwhile says that the alumni association will work with the career center on campus "to help place students in jobs and internships with alumni." That's good, but that's also something every association should try to do, regardless of dues structure. 

100% of the money will go to the association, and they can increase the amount in future years. So how much cash are we talking about? According to the school's web site, in 2007, 5,555 first year undergraduates enrolled. Under the new scheme, the association would garner almost $390,000 in "dues" with that size freshman class. 

On its way to the bank, the association should be careful not to think they've solved the alumni network problem. They'll have generated cash flow, which is no mean feat in days of disappearing affinity revenues and shrinking support from general budgets and investment income. But I would dispute the claim by a student leader who says that this approach "builds a community." He further explains, 

When you're setting foot on this campus, you're part of a huge alumni network. We're all Buffaloes together.

Every large institution has "a huge alumni network." What matters isn't whether it exists. What matters is whether alumni can activate the network and access its resources to fulfill their needs and solve their problems. And it takes more than dues money to accomplish that.

I'm curious to hear others' thoughts about this approach to funding alumni activities. Do the pros outweigh the cons?

University of Colorado Alumni Membership page

Princeton Puts Reunions on Your iPhone

[Updated 14 July, 2009: Blackboard has purchased mobile app/site builder TerriblyClever, creator of MobilEdu's iStanford and other iPhone- and Blackberry-friendly software.]

There are many creative uses for the iPhone, many of them utterly useless. On the other hand, there are times when a web site optimized for mobile devices could be quite useful.

During alumni reunions for example.

Princeton University has created such a site. I don't know if it's the first such effort, but it's the first concerted one I've heard about. Andrew Gossen (who has guest blogged twice for Alumni Futures) shared some information about it. 

The basic rationale was rooted in the convergence of 

1. increasing costs (nearly $10,000) to print 9,500 brochures, listing reunion events and activities, and
2. the large fraction of alumni carrying electronic devices (like iPhones, iPod Touches, and browser-enabled "smart phones").  

Also, the site* (called Reunions Mobile) would convey the message that alumni programming is responsive to broader trends, and it would enhance the reunion experience for alumni. Attendees would optimize their participation, increase their ability to connect with friends and classmates on campus, and simply keep track of "the what, where and when of events" to get the most out of their reunion.

So how did it work? Andrew sent along some metrics and observations. Here are the highlights:

Between 22 May and 31 May there were:

• 4,170 visits to the mobile site
• 1,590 unique visitors
• 15,368 page views

For context, about 9,000 Princeton alumni (and about 20,000 total visitors) are on campus at the peak of the Reunions weekend.

As for the mobile web site: 53% of visitors used the Safari browser on an iPhone, and 65% of users were on some kind of Apple handheld device. "63% of site visitors returned at least once," says Andrew Gossen, "suggesting that they were using it as an online reference tool." He draws these conclusions:

• Reunions Mobile worked well enough to serve as a primary source of information about Reunions for users of iPhones and other higher-end mobile devices. 
• Others visited to check things out, but used the traditional printed schedule in the end. "This is pretty much what we expected, both in the abstract and after testing the site on a number of different devices," says Gossen.
• He adds, "As smartphones garner a larger share of the market, sites like Reunions Mobile will become an increasingly realistic alternative to, or replacement for, printed brochures and schedules."

Finally, Andrew notes that his team received positive feedback and constructive suggestions for future versions. Graduating seniors used the site, as did alumni at least back to the classes of the early 1970s. "I wouldn't be surprised if there were some from the '60's, as well, but unfortunately, Google Analytics can't track class year. [Google Chairman and CEO] Eric Schmidt '76 will be hearing from me about this!" Gossen joked.

I asked a (non-Princetonian) iPod Touch user to review the site's functionality and design. She found it useful, well-designed and nicely-displayed. "It seems well-thought out for the device. If I were an alum on campus, I'd think this was pretty cool," she said. There were minor interface quibbles, but overall it was a positive experience.

And Andrew Gossen's final verdict? 

Well worth the time and effort. For alumni interested in this type of technology, the added value went beyond the utility of being able to access the info on their smartphones. They were also really happy to see that Reunions is evolving in response to changes in the broader social and technological environment. We're signaling that we love and honor our traditions, but we're not bound or blinded by them. 

OK, the time and effort were worth it. What about the cost? Princeton spent "approximately $7,000" to build, test and roll out the site.

In a final, poetic twist, 2009 is the 150th anniversary of class-year reunions at Princeton. Gossen again: "We didn't plan Reunions Mobile to coincide with this anniversary, but launching it this year illustrated the potential for interplay between the old and the new."

For many alumni traditions to remain relevant, universities will have to mix the old and the new productively. Princeton's mobile site for reunions is an instructive example of how we can do just that.

As of this posting, the 2009 site was up and running at http://m.princeton.edu/reunions/

[Updated 2 July: There are native iPhone apps for schools and colleges from MobilEdu]

* For readers who are technically inclined, Princeton web developers describe the Reunions Mobile site as "a website developed for mobile browsers, with special attention paid to the iPhone and Android platforms."

Anonymous Donations: Should We Care About the Source?

Two weeks ago I submitted a topic to the CASE Group discussions on the LinkedIn web site [free registration required]. I am posting an updated version of my question here to generate additional discussion.

Anonymous Donations: Anyone concerned about the source of the funds?:

There has been ample news coverage recently about a series of anonymous donations to US colleges and universities, totaling some $80 million so far. The gifts come with the stipulation that the receiving institution must not attempt to identify the source of the gifts, or the donations may be rescinded.

Should the receiving institutions have concerns about accepting donations of this size without any information about the donor, business or enterprise that generated the funds? I can imagine a circumstance in which an institution later wishes it were not linked to the donor or his/her line of business. 

In reply, Judy Piercey (University of California - San Diego) quoted an article in which her UCSD colleague Juli Larsen (Associate Vice Chancellor of Development) commented about having been approached with a similar offer: 

As a public institution, we do have very stringent rules on gift acceptance. The only way we were willing to enter into this discussion was if the bank itself...was willing to verify [that] the source of the funds was legal and attest in writing to the legitimacy of the donor and the donor's intent.

As it happened, that donor did not make the donation, but the point, said Larsen, is that 

This was definitely new territory. It was frustrating....Our work is about trying to connect donors with our people and programs. So obviously we want to meet these [donors].

What do you think? Should we be grateful for any large donation in tough economic times, or should we be suspicious (or at least, extra curious) about large gifts from donors who don't want anyone to know who they are?

Additional coverage of the topic from Inside Higher Ed:

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/05/08/donor