ALUMNI INVOLVEMENT: REALITY VS. DESIRE
You may
know the degree to which your alumni give, attend
alumni events, use the institution’s career
center, etc. And you probably wish the participation
numbers were higher. But have you ever wondered if
alumni also wished they were more involved?
Based on
data from Campbell Rinker’s AlumniPoll
2002, many alumni WOULD like to increase their involvement.
We compared self-reported involvement to desired involvement
across 10 types of activities. Results are seen in
the following graph - CLICK
HERE TO VIEW.
Actual involvement
is fairly predictable – activities
that reflect broad interests and/or require a low commitment
rate high. For example, more than half indicate a high
level of agreement with the statement, “I encourage
people to attend the college/university.”
Four out of ten alumni strongly agree that they keep
in touch with college friends. Between 15% and 25%
of alumni reported strong levels of involvement with
alma mater in areas such as career resources, continuing
learning and keeping up with institutional news. One
in four alumni believes their kids or grandkids are
likely to attend the institution as well.
Fewer than one in ten, on average, indicate high involvement
in specialized interest and/or high-commitment activities
such as giving, participating in alumni events and
following athletics.
Perhaps more important than current activity is the
desire of alumni to participate in activities. In each
dimension, alumni would like to have more involvement
than they currently have. However, the degree of openness
depends somewhat on the popularity of the activity.
Dimensions with moderate levels of current involvement
offer better opportunity for expansion than either
high- or low-involvement activities.
The best
opportunity for increasing involvement is with activities
in the middle – those that have
general appeal but aren’t overly popular. These
opportunities are explored further in the next edition
of the Alumni Report.
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