An alumni association provides with the opportunity to bring together all types of people that share a common bond, the feeling of belongingness and affection towards the university. Being associated to an alumni body emboldens your engagement not only to the institution but also the fellow alumni in the most gratifying manner. It’s a channel that connects and nurtures fulfilling relations between the alma mater, students and the university to jointly keep the essence alive.
Steps to start an alumni body:
1. Starting an alumni body:
Starting an alumni body requires an initiative from an individual or a group of individuals, who would focus on reaching out and engaging ex-students that share a common interest.
The best way to go about this is to share the idea with classmates who you are already in touch with and see if they share the same enthusiasm as you.If yes, you would have yourself a small group of people targeting towards a common focus.
Social media and online searches come in very handy when it comes to locating old batch mates who are active online.This new age tool could also be used to send across the information about the association in formation and invitation to be a member of it.
2. Building Membership Database:
Start building the member’s database with the help of your existing contacts and you could also get help from campus representatives appointed by the university to encourageand promote initiatives like these, simultaneously informing them about a said group coming into existence.
Once you have all the members on-board, having a meeting with regards to the guidelines, group goals, procedures etcetera. should be finalised upon.
3. Formation of Alumni Association:
Depending on the mutual consent of the founding members for alumni association, the nature of the alumni group could be decided upon. It could either be unofficial or official alumni association, the major deciding factor being the size of the group.
The former group being comparatively small in size has a few active members who proactively co-ordinate between the association alumni members and the institute with regards to the events, information or announcements etc.
While the official alumni association requires a proper official formation, set strategies and standard procedures to be followed for its formation and functioning. As this would be a comparatively larger group of members, a hierarchy of alumni positions are set and followed by the members, ensuring the smooth functioning of this association.