Career Services + Alumni Relations = whY Alums connect or disconnect after graduation
FOOW? asked Alums a series of questions about their Alma Maters’ support before and after graduation and how it has impacted their current relationship with their former school. The *respondents’, ages 22-62, provided insight on the challenge of answering their Now What?, with or without their school support.
Depending upon the college or university, career services exclusively supports students up to graduation, while Alumni Relations continues the support afterward. In some cases, the line is drawn very clearly, while in others, there is a partnership between the two that extends Alumni support.
Exploring your Now What? is a journey in both lessons and mistakes, requiring a variety of guides along the way. These guides will come in many forms– teachers/professors, counselors, associations, friends, family and sometimes strangers; but what makes us connect to them is how well they meet our immediate needs, our “Reality”.
Your situation plus your Reality consciousness can make answering your Now What? a tricky proposition. Reality is an unforgiving friend, because it comes with a truth that most of prefer to ignore; it is the space between where we think we are and where we think we should be. You think you should wear designer clothing to project a successful image, but your salary says you should design-your-own.
For some, the transition of their degree from paper into the workplace can make them feel like a wet fish on dry land. They are eager to put their degree to work but can’t quite find their flow to contentment because that flow is filled with experiences of joy, disappointment and discontentment sprinkled with periods of bewilderment. The process of merging our expectations with reality comes with expectations not being met immediately, feelings of being underutilized coupled with grunt work. People will tell you it is called ‘paying your dues’, but the question you may need help with is ‘how will I know the difference between timely payments and overpayment?’
The career services and alumni relations BIG CHALLENGE is to help with these experiences before, during and after graduation and the solutions are not one dimensional. Their intentions and goals are to create a platform of support for students and graduates ….but as in life; Reality can get in the way:
*Have you ever used your college career center services? 54% – YES
*Are you involved in any alumni activities – 88% – NO
Perception, Reality, Intention, Frustration, and Guidance are the parts that we review to solve for wh(Y) in this series. UP NEXT – 2/26/09 blog, we discuss the reasoning behind the numbers … from the ’08 alum who said: “I almost feel forgotten by my university” to Alums who found their career center “very helpful” to “there was nothing they could provide that I couldn’t figure out for myself”.
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