​Welcoming alumni back to the Duke community

Thousands of alumni descended on campus last Friday, reveling in cherished memories, old friendships and immortalized exploits over the course of Alumni Weekend. While alumni weekend seems to attract large crowds, it is concerning that personal interactions between alumni and the campus only visibly manifest this one time each year. Many students feel that post-graduation, all Duke wants from its alumni is their money. Even just before graduation, undergraduates are asked for a senior gift as a foot in the door. To some extent, the loosening of the relationship between alumni and campus is natural, as old ties fade and college relationships are replaced by professional ones. However, it is important to recognize and take advantage of the fact that our alumni are a tremendous resource, not just for the University or in a pecuniary sense, but as a multidimensional resource for students.

There is already precedent and an extant scaffolding for students to make direct connections with alumni. For the many students seeking professional relationships, the old DukeConnect was a useful tool for connecting undergraduates to alumni in different fields. Although it was recently phased out and its presence is missed, the administration has promised to roll out a replacement service soon. In the meantime, while students can connect to alumni via LinkedIn, the platform forces students to scan a huge pool of users in order to find Duke alumni and requires them to perform awkward cold calls.

The creation of the new Duke Intros program promises to fill some of the gap left by DukeConnect. The two seniors who designed it, James Brock and Braden Tierney, deserve applause for creating a means to draw alumni and students together in a more personal way such that both sides feel comfortable with the relationship.Their project has already garnered significant student demand in the short time since it has launched. If the program is to scale up, however, it will need to expand beyond the two seniors and become formally run by the Alumni Association or the Career Center. Duke Intros, combined with the already-existing Duke Angel Network and the coming replacement for DukeConnect, will provide undergraduates with a host of excellent ways to find jobs, experience and advice through alumni. In the future, we hope to see such programs also expanded to take care of graduate students, who are sequestered to the underfunded Graduate Career Center and do not have a corresponding graduate alumni affairs office.

Although alumni offer much opportunity for career advancement, student-alumni relations do not have to be ends-based. For example, the Duke Reader Project pairs undergraduates and graduates with alumni for feedback on writing projects, demonstrating one way in which alumni stand to share themselves as resources for current students. Further, seeking internships, jobs and funding help achieve material gains, but students equally stand to benefit in an abstract way by learning about alumni experiences. Mentorship should be a real goal for the alumni-student relationship. College is anxiety-producing by nature, and alumni relationships offer a chance to seek the advice of people who have already weathered their undergraduate careers here at Duke. For any student seeking long-term mentorship and advice, alumni promise the opportunity for fruitful, life-long connections that can provide far more than just a shot at stable work.